My First Seven Years (Plus a Few More) (20 page)

She was clearly flattered at having produced such emotion in me. I stood up on the bed and began mimicking her various ways of walking, real mannequin parade stuff, in front of us awestruck lads, her way of running, jumping … I even imitated her voice and laughter. Lucy rolled about laughing, and in fact careered about on the bed so much that she fell off and landed on the floor with a great thud. ‘Oh God, my head! What a bump!' I had to take hold of her to help her back to her feet. She embraced me and gave me a tiny peck on the cheek. My heart was beating in my temples, in my chest and right down to my toes. We carried on chattering, lying one close to the other, but when the first rays of light began to filter in through the shutters, it was a struggle to speak; our words came out mangled by sleepiness. We fell asleep like two children. For both of us it was first love. I was seventeen and she fourteen. Blessed be that squall!

CHAPTER 22

Fleeing to Switzerland

I was seventeen when the British and Americans landed in Sicily. A few months later, the Fascist government fell and the king decreed an armistice. In the immediate aftermath, many men from our neighbourhood returned home, some from Yugoslavia, others from the South of Italy. I saw one friend of mine return from Croatia dressed as a train driver, another arrive on a woman's bicycle disguised as a baker, covered in flour; yet another was done up in a strange mixture of sailor's trousers and postman's jacket.

Some days after that, I found myself in Milan, in the house of my uncle Nino, my mother's brother, who had been granted exemption from military service. He came to meet me at school. ‘I need you. Perhaps you can help me.'

‘Glad to. What do you need?'

‘Women's wigs!'

‘Wigs! What for?'

‘Later. I'll explain later.'

At one end of Corso Garibaldi, there was a shop where wigs were on sale cheaply. We went there. They had about a dozen moth-eaten samples, all at bargain prices, so my uncle took the lot. ‘Come with me to the station.'

When we got there he said: ‘It might be a good idea if you were to come with me to Sartirana. Maybe you could make yourself useful!'

‘Just what do you plan to do with those wigs in Sartirana?'

Once we were inside the compartment, he opened the sack he had with him. Inside, all musty, there were some women's dresses. Then from a semi-rigid bag, he took out a box with make-up. ‘Are you going to do a performance?' I asked.

‘Almost. In Torreberretti, there's a camp with British, South African and a few Indian prisoners. The garrison that's supposed to be in charge of it has made off, so now we've got to get them to Switzerland before the Germans wake up to the fact. I have been asked to take care of about fifty of them. If I stick them all on a train in civilian clothes, they'll stand out too easily. I can hardly pass them off as people going to the Pirelli factory annual picnic! Apart from anything else, about a dozen of them are Scottish, almost all with red hair and white faces splattered with freckles. Another half a dozen are South African, one metre ninety tall, and feet that take a size fifty-four. And that's before we get to the four Indians that look like versions of the famous Tugh from Malaya!

‘I don't get it, Uncle. Do you really believe that if you dress them up in wigs and make-up they could pass as a Variety chorus on the move?'

‘I've not going to dress them all up, just about ten of the ones who would stick out like sore thumbs. Then we'll put them all onto the same train as the
catariso
folk.'

‘And who would they be?'

‘The
catariso
are the people who come to Lomellina from the city in search of a few sacks of rice, rye or wheat so that they can for once eat like human beings. The guards on the government warehouses let them get away with it, because as long as the amount does not exceed a couple of kilos a head, it's permissible. All we have to do is mix our prisoners in with the
catariso,
who are mostly women. In fact, we might even entrust some of the more passable ones to them!'

‘Are you sure that these
catariso
women are prepared to take the risk?'

‘Don't worry. Women are always more generous, and they're always the ones prepared to run risks.'

The following morning, when it was still dark, we went to the station at Sartirana. The train coming from Mortara for Novara and Luino arrived. It was already quite busy, mainly with
catariso
women with their bags and packages. The train stopped, took on more passengers, then, instead of moving off, reversed to the shed where it was joined to a goods train. I learned later that this manoeuvre was a ruse to allow the liberated prisoners to get onto the rear coaches undercover, in other words, to dash out from the arches in the shed, out of sight of the guards on duty in the station. Clearly the engine drivers and conductors had been squared.

I followed Uncle Nino down to the rear coaches. Four comrades from Sartirana had been put in charge of overseeing the transport. As my uncle had forecast, at least a dozen women had volunteered to take part in the adventure. Some of them were obviously completely unconcerned about any risk they might encounter. ‘If we're rounded up, I want to be locked up with that good-looking Scottish guy who is disguised as a rice-gatherer!' one of the women giggled.

It was an exceptionally well-assorted gang of escapees! Almost the whole bunch were done up in trousers which were too short and tight, while those with the wigs on their heads looked like dockside whores in the middle of a particularly bothersome period of abstinence. Someone had even put a baby who was kicking and screaming in abject terror on the knees of one of those streetwalkers.

The greatest danger was that some traveller or other would ask one them a question, for not one of them had so much as a word of Italian. Of the four from the Indian subcontinent, two spoke an impenetrable Bangladeshi dialect while another was so dark of skin that not even a heavy dose of foundation cream would have lightened his complexion. Having tried everything else, they had decided to swathe his face in bandages, leaving openings for the eyes, nostrils and the mouth. To hide his hands, they had got someone to knit waiter-style gloves. If anyone asked what had happened to him, the reply was that he had been standing nearby when flames from the furnace had blown out … burns all over.

As luck would have it, the coach was so packed that no one was able to get on. Instead, at each stop, we leaned out of the window to suggest to people looking for a seat that they move towards the centre of the train. Even the guards who were supposed to get on at Novara and go through the two carriages where our escaping prisoners were squatting tried only once or twice to make headway through the crowd, then gave up and climbed aboard further up the train.

We arrived in Luino, the usual half-hour late. It had taken us almost four hours to do no more than one hundred kilometres.

At this point, the whole undertaking became more difficult. A garrison of Germans was waiting for us at the station, and to make matters worse, the number of travellers in our compartment had been almost halved. We could no longer take advantage of the crush to stave off the possibility of inspections. In addition, with the passage of time, the make-up cream was beginning to stream down the faces of the disguised runaways. They now looked like clowns fleeing from a custard-pie-in-the-face competition.

‘Watch out, four “Deutsch” inspectors clambering aboard the rear carriages to pay us a visit!' At that moment, the train moved off, jolting so powerfully that one of the Wehrmacht men, standing with one foot on the running board, was thrown onto the ground. The station-master whistled like a madman. The train shuddered to a halt. Another jolt. The four Germans went racing up towards the locomotive. The head conductor got off to scream at the station-master: the engine driver leaned out of his cab and started screaming in his turn. The Germans tried gamely to get into the discussion, but no one paid any heed to them. As if that were not enough, the normal travellers leaned out of the windows and did their own yelling: ‘We're already a half-hour late! Would you like to wind up your argybargy and get this train rolling again?'

The result was that the station-master cut the whole thing short with one almighty blow of his whistle, the train engine replied with a snort and set off resolutely with the indignant puffing of one who is fed up to his back teeth. The station-master on the platform continued debating the matter with the Kraut guards, and as I drew level with the altercating parties, I had the clear impression that once more the railwaymen in Luino and those on our train had set up the whole scene with the express purpose of stymying the German gendarmes and preventing them from carrying out their inspection.

After half an hour, once we were beyond Maccagno, we arrived at the tunnel a few kilometres short of Pino, that is, a few steps from the Swiss border. The train stopped with the engine and the greater part of the carriages inside the tunnel, leaving only the rear coaches outside. ‘Out, down you get, off you go!'

Hardly had our feet touched the ground when the train started up again. The fifty prisoners and those of us in the escort had made it, even if we had been tossed about a bit!

Not far behind us, there was a path which led into the woods and then wended its way upwards over a steep shoulder. We climbed at the pace of wild goats. The supposedly scalded Tugh pulled the bandages off his face, and with cries of satisfaction, those who had been disguised as women stripped off their skirts and bodices. There was no time to stop and get them into trousers, and so they were obliged to remain in their underpants. The tension caused them to neglect removing their wigs … an ever-more obscene vision.

When we reached the plain above Tronzano, we ran into a group of shepherds – men and women – and at the sight of the various Tughs, African giants, fair-skinned, red-haired Scots and striding women, they opened wide their startled eyes; the women made the sign of the cross. A few more paces and we were on the frontier. We stopped at a hut to get a drink and catch our breath. There waiting for us were a couple of smugglers whom I had known for years, as well as another group of people, men, women and children. In the middle of them, I saw my father, who had come up with the people from Pino. I had not expected to see him up there. We embraced and he complimented Uncle Nino and his companions: ‘You had some courage to make him do a journey like that!'

Two peasant women emerged from the hut to hand out slices of cheese and polenta. A shepherd came up with some flasks of wine, and milk for the children. I asked my father: ‘Who are these people you brought with you?'

‘Jews,' he replied. ‘That's now the third group we've brought over in the past few days. Anyway, I'll have to be saying goodbye to you, because I've to be back in an hour to go on duty at the station.'

Before he set off, he went over to speak to the fleeing Jews. Each one embraced him. As he made his way over the ridge, they all shouted their thanks and good wishes.

The Britons there asked Uncle Nino about that man whom everyone was cheering with such warmth. They were told he was in charge of the organisation responsible for bringing the persecuted and escapees to Switzerland. They, too, then cheered him.

My father, further down, gave a wave of his arm and continued his descent. I was very proud of him.

CHAPTER 23

Voluntary Conscription

The war was coming to an end, even if it was still causing mourning and tragedy. I was beginning to believe that, although there had been some heart-stopping moments when I had escaped only by the skin of my teeth, I had been successful in steering clear of it and avoiding any real trouble.

In Milan, I had the misfortune to be caught in one of the heaviest bombing raids the city had seen. I was lodging with an aunt in Isola, an old quarter behind the Garibaldi district. She had been evacuated to Brianza and had left me the keys of her flat, but that evening I had not made it back from Corso Buenos Aires, where I happened to be. I was getting onto a tram when the alarm sounded and I had to go down into the shelter under the Teatro Puccini. In no time, it seemed as though the end of the world was upon us: plaster flakes and dust rained down on us at every blast. The bombing lasted several hours, with only a few breaks. When the sirens gave the all-clear, we all trooped out and, as the smoke dispelled, we were faced with a horrendous spectacle: buildings in flames, blocks of flats reduced to rubble, piles of debris blocking the streets, emergency vehicles unable to find a way though and fire-brigade sirens screaming on all sides. I saw all around me blank, uncomprehending faces, and I doubt if mine was any different.

There was no way through that infernal labyrinth of twisted metal and wreckage, until finally I stumbled across a boy guiding a Red Cross ambulance, and he showed me how to get out.

The sun was high in the sky when I got back to Isola: same disaster, same acrid, throat-burning smoke caused by the phosphorous bombs.

I made my way to the street where I was lodging: my aunt's house was at the foot of the street, but at the foot of that street there was nothing. The whole four-storey building had collapsed. As I stood there, I felt someone tap me on the shoulder: it was the grocer from the shop in the building opposite. ‘What are you doing here? We had given you up for dead. Not a soul got out of your building alive…'

‘Forgive me if I chose not to be on that list!'

*   *   *

In other words, as I said at the beginning of this story, things were going quite well for me – apart from the terror. I was seventeen and a half, and the end of the war could not be too far off. The Allies had reached the so-called Gothic Line in the Apennines. A few months more and they would overrun it. I was not due to be drafted for more than a year, so I was covered.