Chapter 31 #2
Stella’s head rested against the crook of Gino’s neck, his arm lay across her shoulders.
How wonderful it was to lie here luxuriating in the feeling of being held by her first true love.
The bedhead had rocked alarmingly, the dust had made them sneeze and the mattress’s springs had creaked in protest but none of that mattered.
And judging by the look in Gino’s eyes, the pitting of her thighs and the stomach that remained stubbornly round since Lauren’s birth hadn’t bothered him a bit.
‘I dreamt of this,’ he said, snuggling against her.
‘Same here. I could stay here all day but I suppose we need to get up and go and check on the olive trees.’
‘Yes. I believe that is what I came here to do before you distracted me.’ He laughed.
‘Cheeky!’
‘Come on, then, we’d best get up.’ He dropped a kiss on her bare shoulder.
Reluctantly, she sat up, running her hand through her mussed-up hair. He stretched his arms over his head and gave a deep sigh. Stella swung a leg out of the bed; a minute later she was lacing up her trainers as Gino fastened the last button on his shirt.
He let her step out the door first and locked it behind them.
She followed him down the short path past the water butt.
The olive grove was beautiful, full of carefully spaced-out trees, their silvery trunks twisted this way and that.
She’d never bothered to look at the trees properly before, never noticed the wild lilies growing around their trunks under the shade of their leafy branches.
Her teenage head had been filled with nothing but Gino.
‘The trees have been well looked after for decades,’ Gino said. ‘They didn’t deserve to be neglected this last year, though it doesn’t seem to have harmed them.’
She squeezed a dark bud between her forefinger and thumb. ‘They seem to be growing okay.’
‘We should have a decent harvest this year, even with a rookie like me overseeing it.’
‘You’re doing it yourself? I thought you’d be looking to rent the place out again.’
‘It is a trial run to see if I have what it takes. Do you remember when we talked about going to Sanremo when school was finished, living by the sea?’
Stella laughed. ‘I had visions of days on the beach, nights spent playing blackjack at the casino. It sounded so exciting. How we were going to make a living never crossed my mind.’
‘I was as clueless as you, but back then Sanremo spelt freedom, the opposite of home. The people who lived there didn’t care whose saint’s day it was, let alone who dated who.
But whenever we sneaked away here I couldn’t help thinking what it would be like to work the land, for you and me to have a little house in the village, tend the olives, maybe keep a few goats. ’
‘You never said.’
‘I thought you’d think me dull or that I’d never break free of my mamma’s influence if we didn’t go away.’
‘But you moved to Alassio.’
‘Yes and even when I began a relationship with Gaia I didn’t want to move back to Leto; the village had too many memories.
But working for a boss, even one as reasonable as mine, isn’t how I wanted to live my life.
Ever since Mamma said the old tenants were moving on, I’ve been toying with taking over this place myself.
It was what I wanted deep down all along. ’
‘I wish my papà had known that. He viewed you as some wild tearaway who’d take me away to some corrupt urban existence. Maybe he would have welcomed you if he knew.’
‘It’s a nice thought but your papà’s distress was never about my prospects or where we might live. I was Fernanda’s son, that’s why he would never accept me.’
‘I never understood why it riled him so much. I know Fernanda and her sister were fascists, but Fernanda was a young child. Of course, her sister didn’t have that excuse but she wasn’t the only one around here to keep the faith with Il Duce.
They say the butcher had Mussolini’s portrait on the wall until the bitter end.
Why should Papà single out your family and still harbour such resentment for something that happened decades ago? ’
‘Oh, Stella,’ Gino said. ‘Do you really not know?’
* * *
Stella stretched out her legs, glad of the shade cast by the old olive tree.
‘Of course, I’d heard the rumour that Violetta dated a German officer,’ she said. ‘It must have caused a lot of resentment, her swanning around the village in her fancy little hats and silk stockings when others were stitching old rags together to clothe their kids.’
Gino leant back against the gnarled old trunk. He plucked a blade of grass and rubbed it between his fingers.
‘I have tried to understand my aunt. Maybe she thought she was protecting her little sister’s future by throwing her lot in with a man she believed was on the winning side.
Or perhaps he was just handsome and charming and swept her off her feet into a misguided love affair.
Sometimes people hide the truth from themselves, see only what they want to see.
Of course, she was wrong but I tried not to judge someone who died a long time ago, who cannot tell her side of the story. ’
Stella stayed silent, knowing from his screwed-up forehead and the way he wrapped his arms around his knees how difficult he was finding this.
Gino sighed. ‘It took me years to face the truth. Violetta wasn’t some innocent village girl.
There wasn’t just one German soldier. She went to parties in Sanremo where the Gestapo had their headquarters in the Villa ?berg.
She was friends with these people. Laughing, drinking, dancing.
I look at those photographs Fernanda keeps; although they’re black and white you can see Violetta’s healthy glow, her rosy cheeks.
She was having fun whilst families like yours couldn’t heat their homes or find enough to eat.
But she went further than that. She wasn’t just a Nazi sympathiser. ’
‘What do you mean?’ Stella edged nearer, so their thighs rested against each other’s. He wiped his palm on his jeans before he laid his hand over hers.
His other hand clenched. ‘I was told Violetta was responsible for the German soldiers coming to this village.’
Stella gasped. ‘The rastrellamento?’
He stared into the distance. A butterfly landed on an orange lily, so near she could have reached out and cupped it in her hand.
‘I pressed Mamma to tell me the truth about the rumours. At first she would not say anything but eventually, she admitted it was no accident the Germans came. The first house they searched belonged to the couple who owned the salumeria; they were sheltering a little Jewish boy, pretending he was their own. The soldiers burned that house down. Someone had given them a list of names; they knew who they were looking for. They shot two elderly men who’d lived together for years as more than friends, doing no one any harm.
Mamma was too distraught to tell me about the other victims. And like a coward I never asked her again, I didn’t want to hear.
‘Mamma feels she has to atone for what Violetta did; that is what makes her so devout. And that is why she was always so strict with me. She says we are a family of sinners who cannot afford to stray from the path of righteousness. Some part of me feels she is right, that we do not deserve to be happy. It makes me sick to think that my own blood relative was responsible for that terrible day. But Fernanda still loves Violetta; she lights a candle on the day of her birthday and the anniversary of her death. No wonder people like your papà and uncle despise us.’
‘No, Gino.’ Stella didn’t say any more. She wished she could take away his pain but there was nothing she could say that didn’t sound like a cliché.
He took his sunglasses from his pocket. ‘Let’s go back.’
She clambered to her feet. They walked in silence back the way they’d come.
He wiped a hand across his forehead. ‘How hot it is! Maybe my son is not so stupid, spending the day in his workshop out of the sun.’
‘Did you go and see how he is getting along?’
‘Yes. The plaque he is creating is quite extraordinary, but now you understand why not everyone is happy that a great-nephew of Violetta has been given this commission. Father Filippo spoke up on Leo’s behalf, saying the victims deserved the very best memorial and it was hard to disagree.
No one else who tendered for the work was anywhere in my son’s league.
The day before the committee met to decide, Filippo delivered a sermon about the need for forgiveness.
There were still some dissenting voices but the majority took the hint.
Nearly eighty years have passed. Pietro’s remains are being laid to rest. It is time for the village to heal. ’
‘Leo must be proud he is playing a part in that.’
‘He says he does not think of these things. He doesn’t listen to criticism, he gets his head down and works. He gets so absorbed he cannot think of anything else.’
‘I’m so looking forward to seeing it.’
He took her hand, swinging it as they walked.
‘I could take you to see Leo’s workshop.’
‘I don’t want to disturb him. I’ll wait for the unveiling, it will be a nice surprise.’
‘You will be there, won’t you?’
‘I wouldn’t miss it for the world.’
She didn’t want to think any further ahead. What would happen once Domenico came home? She’d have to move out and rent somewhere but her redundancy money wouldn’t last forever. She didn’t want to leave Gino or the village. She had to find a way to stay.