Authors: Katherine Webb
‘She could sell them. Then perhaps Leandro could pay better wages, or hire more of us,’ says Ettore bitterly. ‘All through this harvest he’s sung the same tune as the others, Pino. “I am on the edge of ruin, I am making no money from this harvest, it costs me more to hire you than I will make selling the wheat.” ’ He shakes his head. ‘Yet he sits there with enough cash to buy Gioia and everyone in it. And Marcie said he still has money in New York – business interests. I suppose his sons are working for him there.’
‘A rich man has a different idea of what being poor is than those of us who are really poor.’
‘But this is Uncle Leandro, Pino!
He
knows!’
‘He knows, but he’s a rich man now, Ettore. It changes a man. Perhaps we would be the same if we became rich.’
‘No. Never. I could never forget, as he has forgotten, where I came from and what I have seen. Or how it feels to eat nothing for four days in a row …’
‘Calm down, Ettore!’ Pino smiles. ‘What should he do, give away all his money and be poor again himself? What would that accomplish?’
‘Perhaps he would get his soul back.’
‘Are you a man of God, now?’ says Pino, and Ettore smiles sheepishly. ‘One step at a time, and don’t walk uphill unless you have to. Today, you have money. Today, those you love will eat. Be pleased about that.’
‘Take this,’ says Ettore, thumbing two notes from the roll and handing them to Pino.
‘No, you keep it. You have more mouths to feed.’
‘I have more than enough. Take it for you and Luna, and don’t argue.’
‘Thank you, Ettore,’ says Pino humbly.
‘Don’t thank me for something you would do for me, just the same,’ says Ettore.
Just then shots are fired, cracking across the sky and along the alleyway to the two men; they crouch down immediately, covering their heads with the instinct of old soldiers, and in the silence afterwards they look back the way they’ve come as if they might see the bullets, or the enemy. Ettore sees his own instinctive fear mirrored in Pino’s eyes.
We’re not soldiers
, he thinks.
We never were. We wanted to be farmers
.
‘It’s starting,’ says Pino. Ettore stands up, grabs his crutch and sets off down the alley.
‘It started a long time ago. Come on, move!’ Behind them more shots are fired, in quick succession, like a fistful of gravel thrown hard against glass. There are shouts, a rising roar of voices and pounding feet, coming closer. Ettore and Pino rush further into the tangle of alleys, and then into the dead end of the tiny courtyard where Ettore lives.
‘I should go home. Luna is alone,’ says Pino, breathless.
‘Yes, go! I’ll see you afterwards, before I go back,’ says Ettore. Pino claps him on the shoulder and then jogs away down the alley.
Ettore struggles up the steps to his own door, bursts through it and pulls up short. The tip of a blade hovers a hair’s breadth from his throat; he blinks in the darkness and sees his sister’s eyes boring into his.
‘Paola!’ he says, in a strangled voice, and with the rushed release of a pent-up breath Paola lowers the knife, her shoulders sagging.
‘
Madonna
! I almost cut your throat, Ettore!’ she says, putting her spare hand over her eyes.
‘I noticed.’
‘I heard the shots – I thought you were a looter! Or one of those blackshirt bastards.’ She hugs him briefly, not letting go of the knife, and Ettore feels the hardness of her bones beneath her clothes. She smells sharp with anxiety and baby sick.
‘Is Iacopo well? Are you?’
‘Yes, he’s fine. He threw up all over me this morning, but then he laughed about it.’ She shrugs, her eyes going automatically to the wooden box where her son sleeps. Ettore looks around his home. After the light and space of the
masseria
, it’s like a hole in the ground. In the darkness across the room, on his habitual stone shelf, Valerio coughs weakly.
‘And our father?’ says Ettore quietly. Paola shrugs again, her face pinched with worry.
‘Weaker and weaker. He hardly eats, not that there has been much to give him. He has a fever, I think. Just slightly, but for several days now.’
‘You two, stop talking about me as if I wasn’t here,’ Valerio grumbles. Ettore goes to stand over him, and Valerio looks up blearily. There’s grey stubble in the cavernous hollows of his cheeks, brown rings around his eyes.
‘Should I fetch the doctor to see you, Father? I have money – from Uncle Leandro.’
‘Him!’ Valerio’s eyes blaze. ‘He gives us charity now, that arrogant son of a bitch?’ The effort of anger makes him cough again.
‘I worked for it. Well, for some of it,’ says Ettore. ‘So, shall I fetch the doctor?’
‘What’s the point? He’ll do nothing but send you to his brother to buy drugs that don’t work. Leave me in peace, if you want to do something for me. Or better still, go and buy me some wine with that money of his. But I know you won’t do me that kindness, will you?’ Valerio stares listlessly into the shadows. His breathing is a shallow whistle that barely moves his ribs. Ettore grits his teeth.
‘You’ll just give up and die then, will you? When I am away from home, and there’s no one to help your only daughter and your grandson, no one to earn money to feed them? No one to protect them?’ he says. Valerio’s gaze goes to Paola, who stands with the knife still gripped in her fist.
‘My daughter has always done better for herself than I could ever do for her,’ he whispers, and though there’s pride in the words, there’s self-pity too. With a sigh, Valerio shuts his eyes.
Paola flinches a little, and says nothing for a while. She puts the knife down at last, goes to Iacopo and touches his cheek.
‘You have money, you said?’ she says.
‘Yes, plenty. I—’ Ettore breaks off at the sound of a shot close at hand, and running feet. There’s an angry shout, and the wrenching of a door against its hinges.
‘They’re close!’ Paola hisses. She rushes to the door and peers out through a crack in the wood.
‘Should I go? Would you be safer?’ Ettore’s heart thumps hard in his chest, in fear, in anger.
‘Perhaps … perhaps.’ Paola turns to him and her face is the same as his – full of fear and fury. ‘You picked a ripe time to come home, Ettore! If they come in here I will cut their throats, by God I will!’
‘No, Paola! Not unless you have to. Not unless it’s you or them, or they’ll kill you for sure. I’ll go – I’m going.’
‘You mustn’t be out on the streets! Go down to the stable and hide there. Go, go! Be quick. And don’t be tempted to come out and fight. Promise me! They’ll shoot you as soon as look at you.’
‘Who are these men?’ says Ettore, as he reaches for the door.
‘Who they’ve always been, brother, and they want what they’ve always wanted – to trample us, because they hate us. Now go.’
Ettore rushes into their neighbour’s stable, below the room he and Paola live in, and pulls the rickety gates shut behind. The reek of ammonia is almost too much to breathe. The bony nanny goat who lives there eyes him, turning her head this way and that on her stiff neck, weaving anxiously. Her eyes are alien and without sympathy, and she bleats low in her throat, coming towards him in case he has food. Ettore crouches down, looking out through the split planks of the doors. For a few minutes nothing happens. His breathing returns to normal, the goat nibbles at his shirt, and he feels foolish. Then a knot of men, six or seven of them, march into the little courtyard with orderly purpose; led by a man who has twin ammunition belts criss-crossing his chest, a pistol on each hip, and a silver badge in the shape of an axe in a bundle of sticks at the throat of his shirt. There’s something familiar about him, his black curling hair and soft outline, but viewed through a crack and from the side, Ettore can’t place him. Not until he raises his fist to halt the men behind him and turns to go up the stairs, and Ettore sees his handsome face marred by a cleft palate and an expression of ugly excitement. Federico Manzo; Ludo’s son, and Leandro’s servant. Sudden rage grips Ettore; he feels it squeezing him, crushing out the breath and the thought and the reason. His fingers curl around the edge of the door and only at the last instant does he stop himself pulling it open and rushing out to confront the man. He forces himself to remain still; it takes every bit of his will.
Federico Manzo bangs hard on the door.
‘Ettore Tarano!’ he says loudly. Ettore holds his breath; the goat rumbles in its throat again.
He hears the door squeak as it opens, and Paola says, ‘What do you—’ before she is pulled down the steps by her arm, and shoved towards the waiting men.
‘Hold her, and watch out for this one – she’s a whore and a mean bitch,’ says Federico, grinning at Paola’s furious expression. ‘She’s probably got a knife in her cunny, and from what I hear, she’ll use it. Where’s your brother, whore?’
‘At his uncle’s farm, where he’s been for the last two weeks. As you know,’ she says coldly.
‘I think you’re lying.’ Federico smiles, and carries on into the room.
‘There’s nobody in there but my baby and my sick father! Leave them alone!’
‘Shut your mouth,’ says one of the men darkly. ‘Unless you want to cause trouble? We’ll be gone once he’s checked. You needn’t fear for your virtue – if you have any. I like my women to have breasts,’ he says, grinning at her, and his fellows laugh. One of them puts out his hand and grabs at Paola’s chest, making her wince.
‘I have bigger tits myself!’ he declares, to more laughter. Inside the room there’s a thump, and a muffled exclamation, and then Iacopo howls. Paola rushes forwards but is grabbed, held back.
‘
Iacopo!
If you touch him I’ll kill you! I’ll kill you!’ she shouts. Ettore can’t keep his breathing even, his whole body shakes with adrenalin; he silently begs Paola to be still. He hears, but can’t see, Federico speak from the top of the steps, and from the sudden clarity of Iacopo’s cries, it’s obvious he’s brought the baby out with him. A new thrill of fear goes through Ettore.
‘What a shithole. No wonder your brother likes it at the
masseria
so much. Tell me where he is,’ says Federico.
‘Don’t hurt him! Don’t hurt my baby, you son of a whore!’
‘Tell me where your brother is, or I’ll drop him off these steps.’
‘He’s at the
masseria
! If he’s not, I don’t know where he is! I haven’t seen him since he went there. Give me my baby! Give him to me!’
Slowly, Federico walks down the steps and Ettore sees that he has Iacopo cradled in one arm, jouncing him gently enough as he crosses to where Paola is held, a man on each of her arms. Federico smiles at the expression of mixed terror and hope on her face. ‘Give him to me,’ she says again. Federico looks at her with his head on one side.
‘He’s a beautiful baby. You must be proud of him,’ he says, in a conversational tone. Then he sighs, pulls one of his pistols and puts it to Iacopo’s head.
‘No!’ Paola cries. ‘No! No!’ Ettore can’t move; he can’t breathe.
Get up. Get up
, he orders his body, but it won’t obey him. These men mean to kill him, that much is clear. No man would put a gun to a child’s head merely to make an arrest, or give a beating.
He won’t do it, Paola
, he sends her the silent reassurance.
He won’t do it – Iacopo is Leandro’s blood.
‘Where is he, Paola? I know he came to Gioia today,’ says Federico. Paola stares in mute horror at her son, and the gun pointing at him. She shakes her head.
‘I … I don’t know,’ she says, barely a whisper. Ettore shuts his eyes in sudden agony. He knows then that there’s no one in the world braver than his sister. Federico watches her for a moment longer, then shrugs and holsters the gun.
‘Perhaps you don’t, after all. Perhaps he stayed at the farm – he will if he has any sense. We can’t get at him there. Not yet, anyway.’ He nods at his men and they release her. She grabs Iacopo from Federico’s careless hold, and cradles him as they march out of the courtyard.
‘Bye for now, whore,’ says the one who grabbed her breasts as he passes. ‘I might come back to see you later.’ But Paola cradles her son, pressing her lips to his head, and ignores the man. For a while the only sound is Iacopo howling, and Ettore wonders if he will ever have the nerve to leave the shit and piss reek of the goat stall. If he will be able to stand the shame.
Eventually, Paola goes back inside without looking at the doors to the stable. Ettore doesn’t move until he hears her call for help, and then he goes in, stinking, silent with hatred, to help her pick Valerio up off the floor.
‘Paola …’ he says, but he’s got nothing to say.
‘Go back to the
masseria
, Ettore. You heard him – you’re safe there,’ she says, tucking the blanket back around their father, pressing her hand to his gleaming forehead.
‘I can’t go back tonight – I’ve no means to. Anna will have left when trouble started. Paola, listen, he … he can’t hurt Iacopo. Leandro is his boss …’
‘I know. I knew it – that’s why I kept quiet.’ Her voice is leaden with exhaustion. ‘What does it mean, Ettore? What does it mean when our own uncle’s servants may come here and threaten us? He would have killed you. Why? Have you done something to anger them? What does it mean?’ Suddenly there are tears in her eyes, the first Ettore has seen since Davide, Iacopo’s father, was killed. He can’t bear to see them; he folds his sister into his arms, rests his chin on the top of her head, and she lets him, for once. A tremor goes through her.
‘I don’t know,’ he says. ‘I don’t know what it means. But I will find out.’ Paola pulls away, wipes at her eyes.
‘You can’t stay here. They might be watching; they might come back to look again. Go to Pino and Luna.’
‘They know Pino’s my friend.’ Ettore shakes his head.
‘Go to Gianni and Benedetto then; go to Livia’s family. But don’t stay here.’
‘All right.’ He gives her all the money he has and she takes it without a word. ‘Paola,’ he says, squeezing her hand with the money in it. He finds it hard to speak. ‘You have the heart of a lion. You have twice the heart of me.’
Everywhere in town are sounds of trouble, clashes. There are several fascist squads on the streets, and many groups of Gioia’s working men, greater in numbers but weaker, and unarmed. The squads attack unionist buildings, and the homes of known agitators; the workers attack the police headquarters, the town hall and the new fascist party offices. Livia’s mother, Bianca, opens the door to Ettore with her face full of fear, and her eyes pinch when she sees him. He can’t tell how she feels about him, but she has been cold towards him, distant, since Livia died. He thinks perhaps she blames him for not protecting her daughter, and he accepts that blame. He blames himself, after all, and now he has more guilt – the guilt of a new lover. He wonders if Bianca can sense it on him – the traces of another woman. Perhaps since Livia was killed by a man who wanted to take pleasure from her, she now hates all men who ever thought of her that way. All men who ever wanted to make love to her.