The Shoemaker's Wife

Chapter 11

A BLESSED MEDAL

Una Medaglia Benedetta

The quarter moon peeked through the alpine trees like a snip of pink ribbon in the purple night sky. By the first day of May 1910, a few weeks after their disastrous meeting with Signor Arduini, the Ravanellis were settled into another rental two streets away from the house where their six children had been born. Enza made fast work to find another house with the help of her boss at the dress shop.

The move from Via Scalina to Via Gondolfo meant less space and a higher rent. Instead of an entire house, Marco rented the bottom floor of the Ruffino homestead, which had a small garden in the back, a patch of green grass in the front, four rooms, and a fireplace. Even though they were lucky to find a house so quickly, leaving one landlord for another was not what Marco had envisioned for his family.

Marco kept the family stable on Via Scalina, refusing to sell it to Signor Arduini. He built a low fence between the two buildings and laid a new stone path to the entrance from the street. Signor Arduini was not pleased with the situation, but Marco would not sell the barn to the man who had forced him out of his home.

When Marco passed Signor Arduini in the streets of Vilminore, he continued to show his respect and tip his hat. Signor Arduini did not return the kindness. Enza’s words still burned in the padrone’s gut like the perpetual flames in the coke ovens below the village. It was a fire Arduini could not put out.

The final piece of the Ravenellis’ bad luck came one day while Enza was working in Signora Sabatino’s dress shop. Enza remembered the day the old lady from Lake Iseo came to pick up her dress for her son’s wedding. Ida Braido was small, slim and white haired, but she had the focus of a much younger woman with a project in mind.

Ida’s blue eyes were clear behind her eyeglasses as she sat in the window seat, waiting for Signora Sabatino to attend to her. Enza sat behind the sewing machine, carefully feeding two sides of a cotton placket under the bobbin. Ida watched her with interest.

“Is there anything a machine can’t do?” Signora Braido asked.

“Fall in love,” Enza replied.

“Or die,” Signora Braido mused.

“Oh, they can die all right,” Signora Sabatino said as she entered from the back of the shop. “I had a buttonholer give out last week. Enza and I have the bloody thumbs to prove it.”

Signora Sabatino held up the dress, a simple pale yellow sheath overlaid with organza embroidered in a pattern of small daisies around the hem.

“I did all the stitchwork by hand. No machines touched your gown,” Enza assured her.

“I like it,” Ida Braido said. “It’s fitting for a send-off.”

“I thought you were going to wear it to your son’s wedding.”

“I am. After the wedding he and his bride are leaving for Naples, where they are taking the SS Imelda to America. I am losing a son, gaining a daughter-in-law, and then losing them both.”

Signora Braido opened her change purse and handed the seamstress full and final payment for the daisy dress. She went out into the street, where her son awaited with a horse cart to take her home.

“All these pazzo people and their dreams of America,” Signora Sabatino said. “What do they think? If every Italian leaves to find a job in America, pretty soon there will be too many workers in America lining up for a few jobs. And then what? They’ve lost their home here, and any possibility of returning. Crazy dreams.”

Signora Sabatino lifted the bin of finished mending and went to the back room.

Enza pulled her small notebook and pencil from her apron and calculated her pay against what the girls made in America. She would have to work several years for Signora Sabatino to make what she could save in one year in America. Enza tucked the notebook with the figures back into her pocket.

Enza adjusted her work lamp over the needle of her sewing machine.

She flipped the bobbin switch and fed the fabric under the needle, guiding it with her hands. The silver needle pumped up and down along the chalk line of the placket. She released the bobbin switch, pulled the fabric away gently from the gears, and snipped the threads with her shears. She examined her work. She had created one flawless seam, quickly, with a sure hand, just like a master.

She had sat back in her work chair when she saw Eliana tap on the window. Enza went to the door.

“Andiamo!” Eliana said urgently.

“Is it Mama?” Enza’s heart sank in her chest.

“No, no. The stable.”

Enza called out to Signora Sabatini that she must go. She ran with Eliana from the shop to Marco’s stable.

Giacomina stood by the worktable, holding Alma, who cried into her apron.

“Mama? What is it?” Enza asked, fearing that something terrible had happened to her father. She turned and saw Marco kneeling in Cipi’s stall. Battista and Vittorio fought back tears as they stroked Cipi’s mane.

The grand old horse lay still on the clean straw as Marco covered him with a blanket. The day they dreaded had come. Cipi was old, and finally his heart had given out.

“He’s gone,” Papa said, tears in his eyes.

Enza went into the stall, Vittorio and Battista moving aside as she knelt next to Cipi, whom she had known all of her life. His shiny mane was still warm, and his brown eyes, even in death, had a sweet expression, one of surrender, where there once had been one of abiding patience. Enza remembered climbing up on his back when she was a girl, grooming him as soon as her hand had grown large enough to hold the brush, and, when she grew tall enough, feeding him slices of apples from her hands. She remembered loading the carriage lamp with oil in the winter, and making bouquets of fresh flowers to attach to the carriage in summer. Cipi had pulled the carriage that carried Stella’s coffin, and had taken every bride and groom from Sant’Antonio down the mountain to Bergamo after their weddings. She remembered braiding Cipi’s mane with ribbons on feast days—red on Christmas, white on Easter, and pale blue for Santa Lucia. She remembered leaving the house on the night of a snowstorm and going to the barn to throw an extra blanket over him. She remembered shaking the sleigh bells on the carriage at Christmastime as Cipi pulled the children through the streets while the snow fell. She had taken excellent care of this horse, and in return, he had served her family loyally and well.

The long shadows of her brothers, sisters, mother, and father looked like tombstones against the stable wall as they stood around Cipi. Enza rested her body against the horse she had loved all of her life, taking in the clean scent of his lustrous coat.

“Thank you, Cipi,” Enza whispered. “You were a good boy.”

Besides having been May Queen at Our Lady of Pompeii Church, Felicitá Cassio was also the privileged daughter of a grocer in Greenwich Village who had emigrated from Sicily with his bright, sturdy wife and built a small empire that began with a fruit stand on Mott Street and eventually spread to every corner below Fourteenth Street.

As her father loved peddling fresh fruit, strawberries and cherries, Felicitá loved boys. Ciro pursued Felicitá in the weeks after the festival, but he didn’t have to work too hard to win her; just as he had chosen her, Felicitá had chosen him.

She arranged to stop by and visit with her friend Elizabeth Juviler at the cheese store on Mulberry on a regular basis, with the goal of running into Ciro. When she discovered that Ciro made deliveries of boots and shoes he had repaired to the factory workers in the West Village, she made sure to take a walk across Charles Street when she knew she might run into him. Felicitá had a serious attraction to the mountain boy. She was taken with Ciro’s light hair and eyes, and he was enamored of her bella figura, the envy of every girl in Little Italy.

Felicitá was thinking how lucky she was as she brushed Ciro’s hair off his face and studied his profile as he napped. Her parents worked long hours in the business, and she had their apartment to herself during the day. An only child, she cooked and cleaned for her parents in exchange for everything a girl of sixteen desires.

Felicitá found Ciro more impressive than the compact Sicilian boys, who were attractive enough with their thick eyebrows and Roman noses, but only a couple inches taller than she. They were also too eager to please for her taste. She liked that Ciro didn’t fawn over her; he was remote, yet warm, and Felicitá saw those attributes as signs of maturity. Ciro was so tall he barely fit in her small bed. Her shoes, resting nearby, could easily hide inside his.

Ciro stirred and opened his eyes. She once had a party dress the exact blue-green color of his eyes.

“You should go,” she said.

“Why?” He pulled her close and rested his face in her neck.

“I don’t want you to get caught.” She sat up and pulled a small crystal bowl filled with her jewelry off the nightstand. She slid delicate rings—thin, embossed gold bands, others inlaid with round opals and shimmering chips of citrine—onto her fingers.

“Maybe I want to get caught,” Ciro teased.

“Maybe you ought to get dressed.” Felicitá fluttered her fingers, now sparkling with metal and stones. She flipped her long hair to the side and snapped on a necklace with a holy medal. “Hurry up. Papa will kill you,” she said without the slightest urgency.

Ciro pulled on his pants and then his shirt.

Felicitá grabbed Ciro’s hand. “I want that ring.”

“You can’t have it.” He pulled his hand away, laughing. They’d played this game before. “Your name doesn’t begin with a C.”

“I’ve always wanted a signet ring. They can scrape off the C at the jeweler on Carmine Street. Then they can size it and carve an F on it. It looks like good gold. 24K?”

“I’m not giving you the ring.” Ciro put his hands in his pockets.

“You don’t love me.” She pulled the bedsheet around her body as she kneeled on the bed.

“I’ll buy you a different ring.”

“I want that one. Why won’t you give it to me?”

“It belonged to my mother.”

Felicitá softened. Ciro had never mentioned this detail before. “She died?”

“I don’t know,” Ciro answered honestly.

“You don’t know where your mother is?”

“Where’s yours?” Ciro shot back.

“On the corner of Sixth Avenue, selling bananas.”

Ciro reached down and kissed her on the cheek. “I’ll buy you something nice at Mingione’s.”

“I don’t want another cameo.”

“I thought you liked the cameo.”

“It’s all right. I’d rather have something with shine.”

“Let your fiancé buy you a stone with shine,” Ciro said.

“I’m not ready to get married.”

“Your parents made a match.” Ciro slipped into his shoes. “You’re obligated.”

“I don’t always do what they say. After all, you’re here—” As Felicitá stood, the sheet fell away.

Ciro took in her golden skin, soft curves, and sleek lines. She resembled the statues in the church of San Nicola. He pulled her close and buried his face in her thick hair, with its scent of sweet vanilla. “You know I’m a lost soul.”

“Don’t say that.” Felicitá kissed his cheek. “I found you. Remember?”

Felicitá pulled on her robe and walked Ciro to the front door of the apartment. She lifted a blood orange from the bowl on the table and gave it to him, along with a good-bye kiss. Ciro slipped out of Felicitá’s building and walked back to Mulberry Street.

He peeled the orange and ate it as he walked through Little Italy. The orange was sweet, the September air cool, and the sky teal blue. The seasons were changing, and so was Ciro’s point of view. It was after making love, when he felt satisfied, that Ciro did his best thinking.

He thought about Felicitá. She had been good to him. Felicitá had taught him English, as she spoke both English and Italian. She mended his clothes and replaced buttons on his coat. He imagined he was in love with her, but his feelings did not consume him, and not just because she was betrothed to another. He had always believed true love would overwhelm, capture, and guide him to the safe shores of fidelity like a boat made of fine wood, varnished against the elements. But it hadn’t, not yet anyway, and not with Felicitá. He was waiting to feel that deep attachment take hold within his heart. He knew for sure it existed. He remembered it on the mountain. He remembered his mother and father.

The wind whistled through the trees as Enza made her way up Via Scalina toward home. She heard the hinges on the gate as she passed the old house they used to rent, the light of a new family pouring out of its front windows. The Arduinis had turned around and rented it to another family as soon as the Ravanellis moved out. Next door, her father’s stable was dark, the windows latched, the doors chained, and had been so since Cipi died. The night air had the scent of oncoming snow, but in October, it was early for the storms.

Enza pushed the front door of the house on Gondolfo Street open. Her mother and father sat at the farm table, which took up most of the space in the smaller kitchen of this house. Every important family document lay neatly on the table. The brown tin money box rested by Mama’s accounting book, which had a series of figures recorded on a fresh page marked with the date. Papa rolled a cigarette while Mama wrote in the ledger, as Enza took off her coat and hung it on the hook.

“You’re so late, Enza,” Giacomina said.

“I know, Mama. It was my last day at the dress shop, and I didn’t want to leave Signora with a lot of work to do.” She fished in her apron pocket. “She gave me ten lire for the trip.” Enza placed the money in the box on the table.

“She should’ve given you fifty,” Giacomina said.

“Mama. It was a gift. You taught me to be grateful for them, no matter how small.” Enza went behind her mother and wrapped her arms around her. “You’re the best mother on the mountain. You taught me good manners and . . . patience. That’s why I expect so little from cheap bosses like Signora Sabatino. Besides, we don’t need her money. We saved all year long, and we have our passage.”

“Which is the money we usually use to survive the winter.”

“Mama, as soon as Papa and I get to America, we’ll get jobs and start sending you money. Please don’t worry,” Enza said. “Your tin box will be full by Christmas.”

“Maybe we should go in the spring, Enza,” Marco said.

Enza was tired of arguing with her father. He agreed to the plan, and then doubted Enza’s logic. Marco had had a terrible time making decisions since Stella died. Enza gradually took on more responsibility as her father grieved.

Enza spoke kindly but firmly to her father. “Papa, we’ve thought about this long enough. If we work hard for the rest of our lives in Schilpario, we will never save enough to buy a house. We need to make real wages. The scraps from summer tourists will never be enough. We’ll go to America, make the money, and come back as soon as we can. It’s the only way. Someday we’ll have the life we dreamed of.”

Giacomina handed an envelope to Enza. “From my cousin.”

Enza read the back of the envelope: Pietro Buffa, 318 Adams Street, Hoboken, New Jersey. “What’s he like, Mama?”

“I don’t know him very well. I know that he has a wife and three sons, and the sons have wives, and some have children. There’s a lot of work there for you to do.”

Enza tucked the letter into her apron pocket. She would find work in a factory and, in exchange for room and board, cook and clean for the Buffa family. How hard could it be? She had been helping her mother since she could remember.

Eliana came out of the bedroom. “I wish we could all go with you.”

“How long will it take you to make enough to buy a horse? Because I will keep the stable going until Papa returns,” Vittorio asked from his cot.

“We’ll make enough for a new horse,” Enza promised. “And then enough to build our own house.”

“You stay here and help Mama, and we’ll be back before you know it,” Marco said.

Enza smiled at her father gratefully. “As fast as we can.”

“What if you like America more and forget about us?” Alma said from her loft bed above the kitchen.

“That will never happen,” Papa assured her.

“I’m going to get a job sewing, and Papa will build all sorts of things: bridges, railroads.”

“Whatever they need,” Marco said.

“Just picture the house,” Enza said. “And it will come true.”

“Then we’ll be like Signor Arduini,” Battista said from his cot.

“Except Papa looks better in hats,” Enza said.

It seemed the entire village of Schilpario came out to see Enza and Marco Ravanelli off on their journey.

Their friends showered them with gifts—small soaps scented with peppermint from the Valle di Scalve, tins of cookies, and knit gloves that Giacomina carefully wrapped in brown paper and packed into their cloth duffels.

Battista walked Marcello Casagrande’s horse, a sleek black mare named Nerina, pulling the Ravanelli carriage, up to the street in front of the house. He climbed up onto the seat and took the reins.

When Enza climbed up to sit on the bench of the carriage, she looked down at the faces of neighbors and friends she had known since she was a girl, faces that expressed worry, apprehension, and support. From their smiles she drew confidence to go to America and do what she must for her family; seeing their tears, she felt regret that she could not achieve the same goal by staying at home.

Marco climbed up into the seat next to his daughter. Battista leaned forward and patted Nerina’s mane.

As the carriage pulled away, Giacomina waved her handkerchief and began to cry. She had a terrible feeling about the trip, but she didn’t share her worries with Enza. Enza was brave, and Giacomina would never tell her not to follow her heart’s desire. But she warned Marco to take especially good care of their daughter; when she had the bad dream, it was about Enza.

The dream had recurred over several months, after Cipi’s death and the decision to send Enza and Marco to America. Lately, Giacomina had dreaded falling asleep. The details were always the same, which made the dream seem true after a time. Giacomina pictured Enza aboard an ocean liner in a terrible storm, with deafening thunder and streaks of lightning illuminating sickly green waves that pummeled the ship.

Enza, in her traveling clothes, would grip the railing on the deck. Giacomina could see every detail of her daughter’s hands—the slim blue veins, the tapered fingers, the trim white nails. As the storm swirled around her, Enza cried and held on. Giacomina then appeared in her own dream, crawling across the deck to save her daughter. Just as she reached to grab Enza’s cloak, a towering black wave stretching as high as a masthead bludgeoned the deck, swallowing Enza. Giacomina would call out for her lost daughter, then wake in sheer panic. Leaping out of bed, she would climb the ladder to the loft to find her daughter safely asleep. No amount of prayer would stop the nightmare, and no matter how Giacomina tried to let go of the image of her daughter aboard the ill-fated ship, she could not.

As Giacomina waved good-bye, she thought of the dream. She knew in her heart that it was the last time she would see Enza.

As Nerina clopped through the narrow streets of Schilpario, Enza turned to take one last look at Pizzo Camino, and the eternal white peaks of the Italian Alps that towered over the rolling green hills of the Orobie Prealps. She had been born and baptized on this mountain. She promised herself she would return and raise her children here; and someday, when she was old, she would be buried next to Stella under the blue angel.

It didn’t occur to Enza to be sad that circumstances were so dire that she and her father had to leave their family to make enough money to buy a house. As she had always done, she would imagine the house in her dreams and build it beam by beam. The goal was to come home as quickly as possible. That dream would fuel her ambition. She would work as many hours a day as she could stand, save every penny, and return to Schilpario as soon as possible. There was no regret on this day, only hope. The Ravanellis had plenty of love, and now they wanted security. Marco and Enza would see to it that they had both.

As they passed the church of Sant’Antonio da Padova, Enza made the sign of the cross. As they approached the cemetery, she asked her brother to stop the cart.

Enza climbed down from the bench, opened the wrought-iron gate to the cemetery, and walked the gravel path to the family grave. Standing before the small angel on the marble headstone, she prayed for her sister.

Gravel crunched behind her as her father joined her by the grave.

“What it is about grief, Papa? It never leaves you.”

“It’s there to remind us of what we had,” he answered. “It’s a terrible trick played on the living.”

Enza lifted a chain from around her neck and slipped a medal of the Sacred Heart off its bale. She kissed it and placed it on Stella’s grave.

“We should go,” Marco said. “Or we’ll miss our train.”

Marco put his arm around his daughter and walked her out of the cemetery.

As Nerina descended the mountain pass, the old carriage bounced over the pits and grooves in the Passo Presolana. Rainstorms had pounded the road and flooded the surface, wearing the gravel away, leaving streaks of cinnamon-colored mud. Enza would remember the exact shade of that color, and when she sewed, she would often choose a similar rich, reddish brown in wool and velvet, a hue that held meaning and memory for her.

If only Enza had known that this would be the last time she’d descend this mountain and overlook the gorge, she might have paid closer attention. If she had known that this would be the last time her mother held her in her arms, she might have clung to her more tightly. If she had known that she would not see her brothers and sisters again, she might have listened more carefully to every word said that day. In the years to come, when she yearned for the comfort of her family, she would conjure this day and try to recall omens and clues.

Enza would have done everything differently. She would have taken her time to acknowledge that one part of her life was ending and a new era had begun. She would have held Alma’s hand longer, given Eliana the gold chain she had always coveted, and told one final joke to Vittorio. She would have touched her mother’s face. Maybe, if she knew what lay ahead, she would never have made the decision to leave Schilpario in the first place.

Enza might also have noticed that the shadows beneath the Pizzo Camino were more menacing than they had ever been; but she didn’t see them. She wasn’t looking up, and she wasn’t looking back; instead, she kept her eyes focused on the road ahead. She was thinking about America.