The Woman at the Window (9 page)

Awful echo from a vanished world. Uncle Vittorio's exhortations. The old fraud. The old fool.

‘Life is an adventure, Luigi. Always be swift and well directed as a torpedo in a stormy sea!'

A short sharp academic sticking his chin out like his hero, and his goatee wagging as he went on chewing up the world into words.

‘Be your own man, Luigi. As sharp as steel on a whetstone! Stoke the fire in your heart with bitter memories of all your beloved country's humiliations.'

Whatever Uncle Vittorio chose to say was Holy Writ in his brother's humble abode. Had he not fought and run and fought again on the Piave and been among the first to sense the overwhelming genius of their country's saviour? Uncle Vittorio had achieved the ultimate accolade of a professorial chair. He corresponded with Gentile and Bottai. He lived in a fine house undisturbed by childish caterwauling, and he had roses growing on the terrace, which he loved to water. Luigi was the nephew he chose to single out from his bank- clerk brother's brood, and favour with advice and exhortation and occasional pocket money and talk of conquering a future with a capital F. Luigi was the best looking and, from the conquest of Abyssinia, designated to take part in victory celebrations and wear an assortment of becoming uniforms.

‘As Luigi grows, the Empire grows!' said Uncle Vittorio. 

His brother was always eager to agree with him. Luigi's mother was proud too. Her boy was a picture. But she was always so apprehensive. Uncle Vittorio attributed that weakness to her peasant origins.

‘If the sight of blood upsets you, boy, I recommend you visit the slaughterhouse once a week until you get used to it!'

The goatee wagged and Luigi obeyed. Believe, obey and fight. That's what it all amounted to. Uncle Vittorio seemed privy to Il Duce's innermost thoughts. They had it all worked out. In order to ensure a glorious future they had to revive the Roman Empire in a new streamlined, modern form. To do that they had to conquer the air. And to do that they needed to dare and hold their nerve. Abyssinia was the perfect illustration. Natives could always be bombed into submission. Il Duce made his sons airmen and Uncle Vittorio stuffed Luigi into the air cadets. With reduced railway fares the great man took the entire family to visit the huge 1937 exhibition celebrating the two thousandth anniversary of the birth of the Emperor Augustus. Luigi was growing fast; the uniform he wore was too tight for him and he vomited in the Foro Romano.

‘Be bronze, be bold! Build yourself up in his image!' 

Be pale. Be sick. Be dead. She wouldn't miss him. Would it be worth going on living to shoot her?

The great pride of his life had been to march at her side in that last triumph. Uncle Vittorio said their photo in the local paper should be made into a Youth at the Helm poster. Luigi Perone and Sylvana Lanzi. The Fascist future. Sylvana was the youngest daughter of Avvocato Lanzi and the Lanzis were the wealthiest family in Castiglione.The town was held together by the alliance between the Avvocato and the Professor. Uncle Vittorio called it a marriage of convenience in his nephew's hearing. In her black uniform Sylvana was style incarnate. She had a pretty bell-like voice, liable to ululate when expressing reproach. This did nothing to deter Luigi. He stole her photograph from the noticeboard of the Casa Balilla and hid it under his mattress along with a colour reproduction of Botticelli's ‘Birth of Venus'.

The first impact of the war was the end of celebrations and youth parades. People were encouraged to tighten their belts and stick closer together. That suited Luigi. Increasing co-operation between the Avvocato and the Professor meant he could see Sylvana oftener. War or no war that was more than enough to gladden his heart. The moonlight meant something then. They could sit on the stone bench in the public gardens and she would allow him to hold her hand while she complained about her sisters and the intolerable restrictions of her life at home. Her mother wouldn't allow her to join the Croce Rossa, no matter how becoming she looked in the uniform. ‘We have a duty to ourselves,' her mother would say. ‘And life should be a stretching experience.' He'd been stretched all right. And now he was stretched out. Already dead inside.

And yet the young could sometimes wear white and play tennis. Uncle Vittorio would glue his ear to the wireless and fulminate and fume about the conduct of the war and curse one incompetent general after another. It was the only time he ever heard his uncle criticise the great leader. ‘How is it after every disaster the culprit gets promoted to Field Marshal?' On the loggia of the Villa Lanzi the Professor and the Avvocato would mutter about shortages and vital resources and unite in criticising Count Ciano and his cronies. Uncle Vittorio even went as far as calling them ‘corrupt degenerates'. They had to blame somebody. Never themselves.

That summer morning they set out together on their bicycles for the mountains. It was freedom bordering on ecstasy printed forever on his brain. Beyond the vineyards and the orchards and the fragrance of the chestnut forests to a world still green in the sun. Bathing in the mountain stream, and the command in those tinkling tones to move away while she undressed. Glimpses of a white thigh between obedient fingers. Home-baked bread in the saddlebag of his bicycle and his mouth in the stream and Sylvana's rippling reflection in the water like a glimpse of heaven. For the first time she allowed him to nibble her shell-like ear while she murmured her distress about a gallant cousin wounded on the terrible Russian front and now convalescing in a hospital in Senigallia. Would he ever walk again and could she go and visit him, the first love of her life? Intoxicated with devotion, he vowed to get her there. He never did. She allowed him to kiss her chaste lips but resisted the crude thrust of his tongue. After the initial disappointment, it was enough to raise her even higher on her celestial pedestal.

That unforgettable day. The young people's prolonged absence had gone unnoticed. On the loggia the Avvocato and the Professor were locked in heated argument. The world had come to an end and they disagreed violently what to do about it. The enemy had landed in Sicily like a hobnailed boot on an anthill, and the bewildered creatures were already scattering in all directions. The Fascist Grand Council, by a vote of nineteen against six, had put an end to the dictatorship. The King had placed Mussolini under arrest. Uncle Vittorio was tramping up and down the loggia smelling out traitors. ‘That Ciano,' he said. ‘Didn't I tell you? That Grandi! Fops! Tailor's dummies! Why convene the Grand Council in the first place? Why provoke a crisis?' In spite of nervous agitation and much chewing of his trim moustache, Avvocato Lanzi's response was as ever measured, consciously diplomatic. The situation had to be faced. The king, whatever his short stature and shortcomings, was the king and therefore head of the armed forces. A commander- in-chief commanded an oath of allegiance. At this Uncle Vittorio exploded. His oath of allegiance was to Il Duce, the country's saviour. His eyes rolled in his head with the intensity of his loyalty and he foamed at the mouth. Traitors should be shot. The lot of them. The miserable dwarf of a King first, and then that bungler Badoglio. At this the Avvocato stiffened and he called out as though there were an audience present. ‘Viva il re! Viva Italia.' That was the end of their collaboration. As far as he knew, they never spoke to each other again.

In those anxious August days his life was governed by stubborn attempts to keep in touch with Sylvana. The Lanzis owned several remote farms, which in such troubled times, were natural hiding places. There were prisoners of war let loose in the countryside and men from disbanded regiments and heavy German units rumbling south and taking the country over. Uncle Vittorio kept a low profile until Mussolini was rescued by the Germans and then he began to jump up and down again possessed with patriotic fire. ‘Not another inch of ground,' he said. ‘Not another inch. Festung Europa! Hang on my brave boys until our twin leaders unleash their terrible secret weapon that will bring victory with a capital V.'

So he found himself sitting between his cousin Rodolfo and Mario Crispi singing ‘Goodbye, my love, Goodbye', in an open truck driving north, and where were they now? Both dead. His mother's tears streamed down her face when he exchanged his light suit and short-sleeved shirt for the black uniform and badges and his Uncle Vittorio, the old fool, telling her to be proud of her son, and his father shrinking in the shadows. What a world, what a life spinning like a top in ever decreasing circles before it topples over. Always cold. Invisible enemies called partisans shooting out of the dark. A firing squad in a school yard. Blood on the walls. Always cold. Minefields everywhere. Spitfires out of the sky shooting at anything that moved. Mario's legs. Stumps he tried to bind with a belt to stop the bleeding. Never any help when you needed it. He'd seen the bloody saviour. And heard him. A tamed bull with a big cap pulled down over his fat ears and German officers just a few steps behind him. ‘Fight well, lads! This is your Italian Social Republic, so defend it! You still believe in me.' And then he left the motley parade of young and old in a hurry.

In the end that was the one thing to do. Leave in a hurry.

Fear governed the world. The squat, fanatical sergeant from Cremona took a particular dislike to Luigi because he carried a hair comb in his tunic. ‘You mother-fucking rabbits better be more afraid of me than the enemy. When I shoot deserters, I don't miss.' On his eighteenth birthday he filled his rucksack with rations and slipped away from the hay-loft. He thought then he had something to live for. He had to be resourceful. Moving at night. Sleeping on threshing floors. Stealing bread and salami, and civilian clothes from clothes lines. There was a danger of travelling in circles. And then he came to the woods above the terrace hills of olive groves and vineyards and Castiglione on its familiar hill.

Self-preservation made him creep in the dark like a rat down the alleyway to the back door of his home. The back door his grandmother used to leave open on Christmas Eve in case the Holy Family, fleeing from Herod's soldiers, should need shelter and a bite to eat. There would be a flagon and a loaf on the bare kitchen table. The door was locked. He had to beat it with his tired fists. When at last she recognised his voice there was more fear than relief in her welcome. Her life was out of control. She couldn't say how many days ago Uncle Vittorio had been shot dead by red bandits as he was getting into his car. They had vanished and he was buried, and the English forces occupied the town. There was a man called the Town Major installed in the Municipio, and he had appointed Avvocato Lanzi as provisional Communal Secretary. ‘Hide my son. Hide. These are dangerous days. Your father is ill. He has taken to his bed.'

His mother's trembling gave Luigi a fresh access of courage and cunning. Beyond his great-aunt's vineyard there were caves in the rock where the old woman used to keep hens. A dry hiding place in the daytime. At night he could move about. From that heap of abandoned weapons in the ruined church to the edge of the Piazza Cavour. All that was left in the world for him was to see Sylvana and speak to her. In the town there was khaki everywhere and no black to be seen. No Fascists. No Germans. Young partisans from nowhere swaggering around with red scarves around their necks. That was what the world had come to. His first glimpse of Sylvana was entering the Municipio escorted by an officer in khaki. She was as smart as ever in her Croce Rossa uniform. And the officer was most attentive. Most gallant. After dark, Luigi followed her home. She screamed when he placed a hand on her shoulder. ‘Luigi.You are still alive?' That was as much welcome as he gained. She urged him to go away. The red partisans were still around. But for the protection of Major Hill there was no knowing what would have happened to her father. Get away as far as you can. He slunk away like a dog that had been kicked.

He was an outcast. That was all it amounted to. Skulking on the outskirts. From the ruined church to the cave in the tuffo where his mother left food she pretended was for the hens. Soon the day came when bells rang out for victory. Whose victory for God's sake? It was the dancing on the piazza that drove him to despair. Lamps lit in the trees. He watched her dancing in that English officer's arms. The red cross on her breast, starched white collar, white stockings, white shoes. As elegant as ever. So gay. So charming. Enslaving another admirer. Giggling out her bits of English and the officer so plainly entranced. And that clanking song on the merry-go-round about the blue sky getting bluer every day.

The moment the officer moved away he grasped her arm and dragged her outside the circle of light. He refused to be sent away. I've got a grenade in my hand under my coat. You come with me or I'll blow us up. He struggled to stop his voice trembling. She was so close. You would never do it. Don't be so sure. You don't know what I've been through. You've no idea. I know you. She was taking charge as she always used to do. Her mesmerising voice. Her scent. You are a nice boy, Luigi. Sympatico. She was touching his cheek with her fingers. You aren't a savage. You are gentle. That's what I always liked about you. Go now. Major Hill is coming back.

And that was it. The hand grenade still under his dirty cloak. Among the cypress trees two cats began to spit and scratch and squabble. He aimed the grenade at them. It failed to go off. Just as obsolete as himself. He shuffled into the filthy church. Through the torn roof the moonlight shone on the altar. He stretched himself on the bare surface to wait for the slate grey light in the sky that would precede a new dawn.

Vennenberg's Ghost