From Sand and Ash

She didn’t answer. She just stared, probably wondering what he knew and how he knew it.

“A false identity card won’t do you any good here, Eva.” He continued as if she’d given him an answer. “Too many people know you. Too many people know you are Jewish. Your papers will actually get you in more trouble. That’s what got your father in trouble. He was recognized using false papers. You use them, and they will torture you until you tell them where you got them, until you give up Aldo Finzi and Gino Sotelo and Nonno and Nonna too.”

Three pairs of eyes widened and Eva’s chair shot back from the table. “How did you know about Aldo Finzi and Signore Sotelo?”

“I know all about them. They’ve been helping us for years. And I know all about what you’ve been doing too. ”

“Us?” Eva asked sharply.

“The church,” Angelo answered, unwilling to mention names, partly because he knew so few of them, partly because by not naming them, they were safer. To give the whole church credit—or blame—was disingenuous. He’d seen many pastors and parishioners who’d needed their arms twisted and their salvations threatened. But there were many who helped, in whatever way they could, opening their doors, their cellars, and their hearts to one refugee after another. He’d witnessed nuns opening cloisters that hadn’t been breached by a man, any man, ever. Jewish children were hidden in Catholic schools, Jewish mothers were wearing Catholic veils, and Jewish men were becoming monks—albeit temporarily—and learning Catholic prayers in order to stay alive, and no one was trying to convert them.

“Do you really think my friends and my neighbors will run to the Fascisti and give me up? I know many of the local police. Some of them are even friendly. They are Italians first, Fascists second. And most of them hate the Germans.”

“But the Germans are in charge now. Not the local carabinieri. And what about when they offer lire for the betrayal? When they start offering three thousand lire for every Jew? How desperate are your friends? How desperate are your neighbors? Someone will turn you in, Eva. I’ve seen it happen. Some Italians even think that the sooner all the Jews are found, the sooner this all will end. Give the Germans what they want so they will leave. That’s what some believe.”

Santino and Fabia jumped in then, trying to soothe Eva, trying to placate Angelo, trying to talk their way out of the threat they didn’t want to face. It was so much easier to hope it was all going to get better. Angelo knew it wouldn’t.

The subject was dropped for the sake of peace, and they all eventually retired to their separate quarters, Angelo back in his old room at the rear of the house—the servants’ quarters, though he’d never been a servant. There were times he had wished his presence in that house were that clearly defined, that simple to explain or justify.

He paced in his room and finally forced himself to kneel before the old cross Nonno had hung on his wall to say his prayers. It was the Hour of Compline, an hour that should be spent filled with praise and gratitude, but Angelo found himself veering away from praise and reciting psalms of entreaty. “Make me know your ways, O Lord. Teach me your paths. Lead me in your truth and teach me, for you are the God of my salvation. For you, I wait all the day.”

Since becoming the pastor of a tiny parish at twenty-two years old, he had been begging God for direction on an hourly basis. It was a never-ending chant in his head. He didn’t see that changing any time soon. When he was finished, he stood and scrubbed at his face, feeling renewed. He washed his hands and calmed his breathing, and then left his room, slipping through the halls and mounting the stairs, determined to resume his campaign. He was not leaving Florence without Eva.

She answered his knock as if she’d been expecting him, and Angelo breathed a silent prayer of relief that she hadn’t changed for bed. He didn’t need to see Eva in a flowing dressing gown, regardless of how much it covered. She immediately retreated to the window overlooking the gardens Santino tended so carefully, the tennis court where she’d regularly trounced Angelo, and the moonlit darkness that was, to Angelo, menacing in its tranquility. It made his stomach feel hollow and his palms itch, as if the Gestapo stood in the shadowed corners of the yard and aimed their guns at the beautiful girl limned in gold and framed perfectly in the window. He walked to her and pulled her back, drawing the heavy drapes. She looked at him with eyebrows raised and didn’t protest. But she immediately left his side, retreating to the opposite side of her room.

“You told me once that you believed in me. Please, believe me now. The things I’ve been told, Eva. The brutality I’ve witnessed. The soldiers who have made it back to Italy have seen the camps. They’ve seen the trains overflowing with Jews. Train after train. And the refugees have stories. None of it is propaganda. People don’t want to believe, Eva, but I need you to listen. I need you to believe me again.”

“When did I say that? 1938? Five years ago I believed in you. Now, I believe in nothing. I will stay in Florence with Fabia and Santino, and I will do my best not to die or be arrested and sent off to a camp. Okay? You can go back to Rome and your church and continue being Padre Bianco with a clear conscience. You tried. I refused. End of story.”

“Madre di Dio!” Angelo cursed beneath his breath and then immediately berated himself, turning the curse into a silent prayer. Madonna, please. Mother of Jesus, help me control my temper and save this girl. He added a plea to his own mother and to Eva’s mother, Adele, on the off chance that Jews and Catholics all went to the same heaven.

The longer he remained on this earth, the more sure he was that mankind had no clue about God or heaven. Not when they used him as an excuse to kill, to punish, to discriminate. He loved God. He felt God’s love in return, but he felt no special claim to that love simply because he’d been raised a Catholic, simply because he was a priest.

“I have work to do here, Angelo. If you know what I’ve been doing, as you claim, then you know I can’t leave.”

“What does your rabbi say?” He had her there. He knew exactly what her rabbi said. Rabbi Cassuto had already hidden his wife and children in a convent. Angelo had helped arrange it. Soon, the rabbi would go into hiding too. The DELASEM offices the rabbi helped run were closed. All the Jewish aid from the organization would go completely underground from this point on.

Eva just looked at him, her throat working.

“I can’t just hide, Angelo,” she whispered.

“I will help you. I will hide you.”

“That’s not what I mean. If I go to Rome, you have to let me do what I can. I want to help . . . I want to do what you’re doing,” she insisted, but he could hear her weakening. He didn’t let the relief he felt show in his face. He really hadn’t thought he would be able to convince her.

“You’re not in a position to do what I’m doing,” he confessed. “But if there is a way for you to help, I promise, I will tell you.”

“Why do you care, Angelo? Really?” she asked quietly.

Angelo blanched and stepped back, as if Eva had walked across her bedroom and slapped his face. His cheeks stung like she had.

Eva’s expression was stony, her eyes black, as she stared him down, her arms folded across her chest.

“That’s a stupid thing to say, Eva.” He sounded like the boy he’d been, and hated that he was Angelo in this house and not Padre Bianco, ever patient and unflappable.

“Is it? You’ve gone out of your way to make me feel invisible. I don’t exist to you, Angelo. I’m a Jew. Hitler doesn’t want me to exist at all. Remember?”

For a moment they both remembered. Too well. But it had absolutely nothing to do with her being Jewish. And she knew it. Angelo’s breath grew labored as the vise that was Eva became impossibly tight around his heart. Eva was the vise . . . and the vice. That’s what she’d become for him, and he couldn’t deny it.





17 September, 1943