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A dozen twisting switchbacks down the mountain, Santa Chiara hides snug in a deep ravine. Not big enough to be called a town, it consists of a haphazard collection of gray stone buildings pressed hard against a mule path. At the high end of the path, an artesian fountain burbles from a plain pipe, water caught in an unadorned stone basin. Along the ridges, narrow terraces crammed with kitchen gardens, grapevines, fruit trees slice into thin, stony soil.
Staircases ax-chipped from tree trunks angle up the outside walls to plank galleries that lead to haylofts or living quarters. Below, there are shelters for a cow or a few goats, a thick-wheeled wooden wagon, and a mule or ox to pull it. Stone oven-shacks squat near chicken coops, where their warmth can keep the birds laying if the winter’s mild. Flimsy windbreaks surround stand-up latrines: two logs bridging a cesspit.
Inside each house, polenta bubbles in iron pots that hang on chains from tripods over open fires. Colorful pictures of Mado
Putting aside the book he’s reading in the hayloft, Pierino stretches to see as far as possible up the mountain. He shakes his head.
So does his neighbor. The boy speaks so little, you’d think every word cost ten lire, although God knows his mother makes up for Pierino’s silence. This morning, Tercilla caught her daughter sneaking out before dawn, and woke up everyone in Santa Chiara. There were accusations and denials, shouting and weeping. Bettina refused to talk at first, but no one stands up to Tercilla for long. “I was looking for mushrooms last month, and I saw an old gentleman and a boy with—”
“You snuck out in the dark to see a boy?” Tercilla yelled. “Did he touch you? I’ll kill him!”
“I never even talked to him, Mamma! He never saw me! Don Leto said to help the ebrei—”
“Ebrei?” Tercilla wailed. “Dio mio! Those poor people! O la Mado
Her neighbors have been cooking and cleaning ever since.
No one among them has ever met a Hebrew, but they’ve heard that Jews are educated, and dignified, and live in cities. It’s a good thing the ebrei will stay with Tercilla. She has an oil lamp made of glass, and there are books because of Pierino, who can’t do anything but read. Her windows are not just shuttered but glazed, with overlapping pieces of salvaged glass that Domenico carried up the mountain from a city after a bombing raid. Tercilla’s brother Primo was a loafer, but Domenico was a match for her drive. He could fix anything, and had more ideas than most people.
Then again, he couldn’t fix Pierino. And big ideas didn’t save him or Primo from the Germans.
Suddenly one dog after another goes into a frenzy. Barefoot children race to meet the visitors. Hanging faded aprons on pegs, the women of Santa Chiara follow, jamming fists into the pockets of hand-knit cardigans. Old men— ropy with muscle and rank with sweat— arrive last, but in time to see the visitors make the last turn.
Surprise ripples through the assembly. Tercilla’s guests are not the august, bearded sage and worrisome boy they’ve all expected, but a sickly gentleman—“Poveretto!”— leaning on Tercilla’s arm, and—“Mado
“Alberto Blum, Claudia Blum,” Tercilla says gravely, when they draw even with Santa Chiara’s burbling fountain, “I present to you my neighbors.”
The Hebrews shake hands, murmuring, “Piacere” over and over as Tercilla introduces fifty-some members of the Brondello, Borgogno, Bruno, Cesano, Chiocchia, and Romano families. Then Pierino steps from the shadow of the barn.
“Your mother tells me you are a veteran and a scholar, Signor Lovera!” the Hebrew gentleman says.
Everyone murmurs admiration for the ebreo’s very nice Italian, a language they themselves speak only when dealing with officials. Pierino smiles shyly, and everyone notices with approval that Signor Blum does not offer his hand. Unfortunately, the signorina does, and when she realizes Pierino’s right arm ends in a stump just below the elbow, she stammers an apology, which only makes things worse.
Covering embarrassment, mothers briskly dispatch girls for the food and wine. Little boys crinkle up and laugh when Tercilla urges the Hebrews to use the cesspit. Slaps are aimed at small heads, and the boys dance out of range.
When the Hebrews have washed up at the fountain, Tercilla leads the way to her home, stepping aside to allow the guests to pass first under the heavy wooden lintel. Unfamiliar with the smoky, shadowy little house, the Blums stand inside the doorway, letting their eyes adjust to the gloom. Tercilla eases past them and drags chairs toward a long plank table.
Cloaked from neck to ankle like ancient emperors, peasant patriarchs enter next. They settle on mismatched stools and chairs pulled close around the table. Drab in brown and tan, kerchiefed women follow, perching on the earthen platform that rings the room. Excited children run in and out, adding chicken-cackle giggles to the murmuring of adults.
Like a hen-shaped ballerina, Tercilla rocks onto the toes of her wooden clogs and reaches for a jug on the top shelf of a painted cupboard. “This will warm you,” she says, pouring a generous measure of violet liquid into the only two glasses in the village. “Hand this to Claudia, Bettina. It’s genzianella, signore. We make it from a flower.”
The gentleman’s eyes widen above a smile when he tastes the liqueur. Hands folded over her broad middle, Tercilla nods with satisfaction and turns to the signorina, who takes a sip and gasps, and chokes, and coughs.
“È bello!” Claudia says hoarsely. “It’s beautiful.”
“Bel-la!” Bettina corrects. “Genzianella è bella!”
La ebrea repeats the lilting phrase, “Genzianella è bella,” as though it were a poem. Everyone applauds delightedly except Tercilla, who is looking at Bettina when she says, “Thank you for the flowers, Claudia.”
“Niente, signora. It was nothing,” Claudia replies before taking a more cautious sip of the powerful, sweet brandy. “We are molte grazie for the food.”
“Another lie!” Tercilla hisses at her shamefaced daughter, but her eyes warm when she looks at Claudia.
The Chiocchia girls are the first to reappear, shyly placing two bowls of polenta before the ebrei. Everyone smiles when the signorina picks up a wooden spoon eagerly. Thin as a communion wafer, poor little thing. Her father places a hand on hers. “Prego,” he says, looking around the room. “You must be hungry as well.”
A discussion in dialect, and the eldest among them speaks. “Prego,” Cesare Brondello replies firmly. “We ate enough, before. This is for you.”
The gentleman surely feels awkward eating with an audience, but hunger takes over, and everyone is pleased by the small moans of appreciation he makes over each new offering. Roasted potatoes and peppers appear, and bowls of tiny white beans called denti del bambino, baby’s teeth. “No, no!” he cries. “This is too much!” which spurs the women to greater competition. Chestnut bread, eggs fried with mushrooms and onions, followed by a platter of misty-black grapes and petal-thin curls of hard, salty cheese that melt on the tongue.
At last, satisfied with a job well done, the bustling women move once more to the benches around the room, but they never stop working. Drop spindles are taken from deep pockets. Arms rise and fall rhythmically as locks of wool play out. Tercilla says something to a sparrow-sized woman with wispy white hair, who leans over to nudge Cesare Brondello. The old man draws a folded woolen blanket from beneath his cloak and presents it to Albert. “My grandson is a prisoner in La ’Merica,” he says.