“That’s because you couldn’t handle the truth. Clearly. Look what happened to Eva . . . to me, when you found out.”
“She told me you were her brother.” Another accusation that had nothing to do with Greta, but one she had undoubtedly used to rationalize what she’d done.
“I’m not her brother.”
“So she told two lies.”
“Your husband is a murdering bastard, and you are worried about lies told to preserve life?” He fought to keep his voice level.
“Are you even a priest?” she asked, her voice dripping with scorn.
“Yes.”
“Not a very good one,” she retorted fiercely.
“No. Not a very good one, though I’ve always done the best I could,” he said honestly, and realized suddenly that it was true. He’d always done his best with the strength and resources he had.
“My husband said you were in love with Eva.” Again, derision, as if his love were incredibly distasteful.
“I am in love with her. I have always loved her. And I’m going to find her.” He held her gaze, unwavering, unapologetic.
“I knew there was someone. You are the boy from home. The one she wouldn’t talk about.”
He nodded once, and she deflated before his eyes. When she looked at him again there was no more defensiveness, no more contempt. There was only remorse.
“I didn’t want to tell Wilhelm. I cared about Eva. But I knew if he discovered it some other way, if he found out I knew, he would hurt me. Frau Caruso knew, and it was only a matter of time before she talked to others. The secret was just too good. Too rich.”
“I need to find out where Eva was taken. Can you find out?”
“I don’t know,” she whispered, shaking her head. She seemed to fall back to helplessness when she was scared, and he guessed Greta von Essen was scared most of the time.
“Find out where she was taken, and we will do our best to get you out of Rome if you need help doing so. You need to go home, Signora.”
This brought her head up. “Why? Aren’t the Germans winning? The Americans have been defeated at Anzio Beach . . . haven’t they?”
Angelo shook his head. He knew it was only a matter of time. God would not be quiet forever. “They’ve been stalled. But America has the firepower, the manpower, and most important, they have the right on their side. The kind of evil I have seen has to be stopped. This war isn’t about two equal but opposing forces who disagree. This war is about right and wrong, good and evil. And evil must be stopped. It will be stopped. And people like you will be caught in the cross fire when that happens.”
“If I find out where she was sent, how will I get word to you?” she said quietly, not even arguing about good and evil, right and wrong. She had to know on some level. She had to.
“Tell Father Bartolo. He will tell me.”
10 May, 1944
Confession: I don’t know what to do.
Eva’s been sent to Bergen-Belsen. I felt immediate relief that it wasn’t Auschwitz, and then I realized I didn’t even know where Bergen-Belsen was. Greta von Essen came through with the information. Father Bartolo said she was sure, that she’d seen the transport records. I don’t know how she accomplished that, but I couldn’t ask. A few days ago, Greta von Essen left Rome in the company of a group of nuns returning to Germany from an Easter pilgrimage to the Vatican. Monsignor O’Flaherty arranged it.
Northern Germany. Bergen-Belsen. I have a destination. But it might as well be the moon.
The German police in Rome are growing more vicious and desperate as the days go by. A surprise raid on a monastery in the San Lorenzo district of Rome has resulted in the arrest and seizure of three monks and a dozen foreign Jews. One boy tried to escape and was gunned down in front of his parents, who at that point threw themselves on his inert form and were shot as well. The monks were imprisoned, along with the rest of the captured refugees.
We were tipped off by a local Fascist official that a raid would be carried out at an abandoned villa south of Rome where fifty Jewish orphans had been hidden and watched over by an order of Capuchin monks. We beat the raid by an hour, scattering the children among village homes until the Germans left. When they did, we returned the children to the villa and to the care of the monks. We are all praying the Germans don’t go back.
It is a game of cat and mouse, priest and prey, and it’s a wonder more aren’t breaking under the stress. But we have a purpose and none of us thinks beyond the moment, beyond the day. We scramble and pray and sleep when we can.
Temperatures are warming and people in the southernmost parts of the city, near the catacombs and the caves of Ardeatine, are starting to complain about a smell. The dead are making themselves known. The anger and fear in the city, the desperation of the occupying forces, and the ticktock of the end seem to permeate the air with the same stench of death. None of us will be able to hold on much longer. But for Eva’s sake I will. And wherever she is, she just has to hold on too.
Angelo Bianco
CHAPTER 24
THE AMERICANS
When members of America’s 5th Army finally captured Rome on June 4, 1944, there was very little fanfare. The Germans simply left. The long red banners and the Nazi flags were removed from the headquarters on Via Tasso. The homes they’d requisitioned were vacated. The political prisoners were abandoned. They simply retreated. Some said it was the Pope’s influence, some said it was a strategic regrouping. A few said it was respect for Rome’s considerable historic and artistic significance, but whatever the reason, when the time came, they left.
Then the people waited with breaths held, ears peeled. The American planes had dropped leaflets the day before, urging civilians to stay indoors, to stay out of the way in case the conflict grew heated. But there was no fighting. No bombing. Just the quiet fall of leaflets and the dawn of a clear June morning.
When the first American trucks and tanks rolled into town, people didn’t stay inside. They danced in the streets. It was a strange sight, really. Italians, who had allied themselves with a ruthless dictator and fought and died beside Germany’s sons, were welcoming the Americans into their capital city. When German tanks and troops had descended on Rome a mere nine months before, people had died trying to keep them out. It said a great deal about the feelings of the Italian people, about their resentment for being drafted into a war very few of them wanted, made to fight and die for preposterous goals and ridiculous men.
Angelo could only watch with bittersweet relief as the parade of military vehicles clattered along cobblestone roads and people wept with jubilation. Mario and his little family, the nuns of Santa Cecilia, and even Monsignor Luciano and his sister stood and greeted the American troops, who were smiling and waving like movie stars, as they rolled into the city. For Rome, the war was over. For the clergy, for the resistance, and for the Jews in hiding, this day was a staggering victory. They had survived.
Most of them.
But some had not. Some still would not. The war was not over for those who’d been taken. It was not over for Eva and for the numberless Jews still imprisoned in camps in the north and in the east. It was not over for the Allied soldiers who would fight on, pushing the Germans into further retreat.
Two days later, on June 6, Angelo and a small group of priests at the Vatican gathered around a radio as the BBC declared that “D-Day had come.”