A Child Al Confino: The True Story of a Jewish Boy and His Mother in Mussolini's Italy (43 page)

I stopped to look for Gerhard's name and was relieved not to find it, but felt pity for those three Germans who never received a proper burial. Surely they had family and children who would never see them again. The dead animals remained belly-up in the fields for days as a reminder of the battle that had been. I shuddered thinking of what could have been and was grateful my mother and I were alive.

We had just settled in when torrential autumn rains started as though wanting to deprive us of our newly acquired freedom. The dusty roads turned into mud had become impossible to maneuver. For two days Mother attempted to go outside but was held back by the incessant downpour. By the third day she announced, “I'm going to the Howells'. I don't care how wet I get.”

Together we ran and splashed in the muddy puddles. Although the Howells lived less than one hundred yards away, we arrived soaked to the bones. Mrs. Howell helped us dry, prepared a pot of tea and filled us in on what they knew. All the internees were safe and, thanks to the courage of Don Pepe, who had refused to furnish the list of Jewish internees to the German officer, none of the Jews had fallen into German hands. The Kamplers, who escaped the midnight raid and had also taken refuge in Montevergine, were back safe and sound. This bit of news came as a surprise, because during our three-week stay in Montevergine, we had not run into them.

Mother's old spirit had come back. She was cheerful and was once again the
Mutti
I knew and that had a great effect on how I felt. I was such a lucky young man to have her as my mamma! Now that the Germans were gone, we could begin the life we had left behind in San Remo or perhaps even return to Vienna. Papa would come back to be with us soon and Pietro was sure to join us, too. I wasn't quite sure how that would work, but I wished it so much that the thought seemed perfectly logical.

It took a few days to readjust to the new life in our old surroundings. No longer in the charge of local authorities, we were on our own and responsible for our own lives.

“What are we going to do?” I asked. “Do you have any money left?”

“
Pupo
was very good and with one of his letters he sent us money. I hope we get some news from him soon.”

“I never hear you say that you want news from Papa. How about
Omama
and
Tante
Stefi? How about
Opapa
? Whom can we ask about them?”

Mother had a sad look in her eyes. “I don't know. Perhaps soon we will be able to find out what happened.”

Similar questions were raised by other internees. No one had news from family or their hometown. The war was not yet over and we were still separated from the rest of Europe. After these many months without a newspaper, we still did not have one. And because electricity had not been restored, the radio too was denied us.

As soon as the rains slowed, we stopped at Dora's new home. Mother had not seen her little Lello in nearly a month. We found everyone alive and well. Although we were recent friends who had been separated for just a few weeks, our ecstatic embraces were like those of close relatives who had not seen one another for years.

As we were preparing to leave, Dora handed us a pillowcase halffilled with homemade pasta and a round loaf of bread she had saved in her cellar, which she kept fresh by covering it with ashes. “I want the pillowcase back,” she said.

Mother kissed her again. “Dora, how I love you.”

We also visited our landlords downstairs to salute the new era. Even Don Antonio, the devoted Fascist who, of all people, I never thought could be happy with the turn of events, rejoiced with us. We kissed Filomena, but, when Mother exuberantly hugged Don Antonio, his wife had a shocked expression on her face.

American troops had arrived en mass and were now encamped in the woods where Germans once had been. They had set up a battery of heavy guns and hurled their explosive loads over the mountain. During the first few days, the Allied gunners had trouble with their aim, regularly hitting the mountain peak and filling the air with the unbearable noise of whistles and explosions. How this jarred our still-frazzled nerves! The gunners, busy day and night, did little to help us catch up on lost sleep.

Three weeks had passed since we joined the exodus to walk up the mountain and, with the exception of the pasta and bread Dora had given us, we had nothing else in the house to eat. Mamma and I went through the village and found most stores closed and the few open ones with bare shelves.

We also needed water. Not everyone was where they used to be. Many villagers had gone to stay elsewhere but, after much searching, I finally found a girl willing to fetch us water from the fountain.

The American soldiers were our real salvation. Somehow they learned that foreign internees lived in the village and soon began searching for some who may have needed help. One morning, Mother spotted a Star of David hanging from a soldier's neck. “
A Yid
?” she called out in Yiddish.

The man looked perplexed. “You speak Yiddish? In this little village?”

Mamma had not conversed in that language for many years. “
Ain bissle
.” Her voice choked up as a flood of words rushed out. She asked his name, where he was from. Oh, yes, she was also of Polish descent. What city? No. She was born in a small town, a
shtetl
.

Immediately she invited the soldier to Friday supper. “
Die willst ein Shabbes essen
?”

It was Thursday. Mother, struggling between English, German, and Yiddish, made the man understand that she would do the cooking if he brought the food. “
Die kennst andere Yidden
?” Mother asked.

“I know lots of Jewish soldiers. You do not want me to bring every Jew I know.”

“You bring two, three. Not more than four.” With great effort, Mother created a sentence.

“Okay, you got a deal.”

“I got what?” Mother asked.

“You got a deal. It's an American expression. It means ….” He hesitated. “It means it is a fair exchange.”

Later that afternoon, the soldier returned. He dropped two cardboard boxes on the kitchen floor with a big thud. “I brought you some food,” he said. He had a broad smile of satisfaction.

Mother looked in disbelief. “This is very much.”

“That's okay. You'll use it later. There is plenty where this came from. I've got to go. I'll see you tomorrow.”

He had brought enough food for several days, maybe even several weeks: cans of gefilte fish, canned ham, loaves of white bread, butter, and cans of chicken soup as well as cartons of cigarettes and soap. We found items we had never seen before, such as margarine and canned fruit. Mother never even looked to the bottom of the large cartons.

“I have enough to share with others,”
Mutti
said.

Our homemade lamp had run out of oil several days before and we hadn't been able to find a candle in the apartment. But at the bottom of the carton, we found that our American friend had included a dozen candles.

Mother began early on Friday and cooked all day so she could get finished before darkness set in. I helped by starting the stove and fanning it to keep it burning and because we used both burners, I had to ask Filomena for extra wood so Mamma could finish her cooking.

“Erich, this is going to be a dinner fit for a king.”

Friday night, our American friend showed up with four buddies. Our kitchen turned into a Tower of Babel. Communication between Mother, the American soldiers, and me was a comedy of errors. Two of the guys spoke Yiddish, or so they said, and their translation of what we were saying, judging from the other soldiers' expressions, often was far removed from what had transpired. We laughed ourselves silly, and the dinner, which was the first home cooked meal these men had eaten in a long time, was an overall success.

There was a break in the rain, so, wanting to see what a bombed city looked like up close, I ventured down to Avellino alone. I had no idea what was awaiting me or I would certainly not have gone. At the outskirts of the city I found smoldering dead bodies piled up high on street corners. What a horror! The stench of burning flesh stung my nostrils and the sight of smoking human limbs made me nauseous. More than three weeks had elapsed since the air attacks I had witnessed from the mountain peak and most of the victims were still on the streets where they had died.

“Too many bodies,” a bystander said. “Just couldn't bury them.” He told me how Allied soldiers had poured gasoline over the corpses and set them on fire.

I never made it to the center of town. The gruesome sights, worse than anything my eyes had seen during all the war years, made me retreat and turn around to climb the four miles back home. For days I did not tell my mother what I had seen.

We stayed in Ospedaletto one more month, but now life was somehow different. Even though we no longer had reasons to fear, people had trouble adjusting. What had been no longer was and a new lifestyle had not yet filled in its place.

The
confinati
were preoccupied with their individual options. Mother spoke with those to whom she had grown close and, when she came home, she looked puzzled.

“No one seems to know what they'll be doing. Only the Howells and Clara will be going back to Naples as soon as the city is liberated, but the Kamplers don't know. Neither does Paula nor the Weils. I wish I knew where Pietro was.”

The rains kept coming and didn't stop for days. Never before in the twenty-nine months we had been in Ospedaletto had it been so wet for so long. Nature seemed to be making an attempt at keeping us there.

“I have waited long enough,” Mamma said.

While I remained home, she hitched a ride to Avellino on an American army Jeep. She went looking for a place to stay, found a furnished room and came right back thoroughly soaked. “I don't care that I'm drenched. I want out of this
verstunkenes
village. We'll move to Avellino and wait there until we hear from Pietro.”

In early November, when we had planned to move, a downpour descended upon us and turned roads into beds of mud. Armed with her usual resourcefulness, Mother stood on the main road with umbrella in hand and commandeered a passing army truck to move us, baggage and all, to Avellino. The truck belonged to the new Italian army, a shiny new vehicle driven by soldiers wearing brand-new uniforms. I was struck by how fast, only two months since the armistice, these men had made the transition from enemy to ally. But they were truly a new breed and appeared delighted to help victims of their former government.

Sixty-seven months, more than 2,000 days, had passed since that ill-fated Sunday in March 1938, when Hitler's troops had invaded Austria and turned us into nomads. Sixty-seven long months of running, hiding, trying to stay alive and maintaining our sanity. We had survived and were free from fear at last.

Normalizing Our Lives

M
y mother's very first act, after getting to Avellino and dropping our belongings with the new landlord, was to find a public bath. The furnished room
Mutti
had secured for us had a toilet but not a tub or a shower. Three years had elapsed since we had sunk into a bathtub of hot water and, although bathing had never been my most favorite pastime, stretching out in that delicious, clear, warm water this time was most enjoyable.

We stayed in Avellino for three months until Pietro was able to communicate with us through Dora and make arrangements to meet us in Naples. Mamma and I sought out the men from the Palestinian Brigade, soldiers we had befriended during our stay in Avellino and, with their most valuable help, moved to Naples with our limited belongings.

Within days, after we left Avellino, Pietro rented a car with a driver for his trip to Naples. The slightly more than five-hundred-mile trip from his hometown of Mazara del Vallo, in Sicily, over the war-torn roads, took one night and day of nonstop driving.

When Pietro rang the house bell, I ran downstairs and fell right into his arms. I could not get my eyes off the car. Never had I seen anything so overloaded. Four suitcases were tied to the roof and all sorts of other packages were crammed inside. There was hardly space for the two men. But for our Pietro, a Sicilian, flour and olive oil, the main ingredients that filled the car, were life's necessities.

My
Pupo
looked tired and haggard, but he again filled our lives with his smile, his warmth and his overwhelming love.

We had survived the ferocity of war and were together at last. In a few weeks, living in a furnished apartment with the luxury of a full bathroom, our lives in Naples normalized. I started school and, thanks to all the tutoring my wonderful mother had forced upon me, was able to complete the final four months of the last year of junior high without difficulty.

German planes sporadically bombed Naples several times after their retreat from the city. But our ordeal was over and we, like the brave people of London, were not about to be defeated by a few bombs.

On May 8, 1945, Germany surrendered and the war in Europe came to an end. With little time to savor peace, we were soon exposed to and traumatized by pictures of the Nazi extermination camps. Newspapers, magazines, and newsreels were filled with the specter of what was left of a people. We may not have been exterminated in a Nazi camp, but we died slowly with every picture we saw and article we read.

Although old enough to realize that my father, my grandparents, my
Omama
, my Aunt Stefi, and all the relatives I had known could have been massacred, I rebelled against that thought. In no way was I going to accept that all those I loved so dearly had perished.

“
Mutti
, tell me it's not true.”

“Who knows? I keep hoping for a miracle.”