A Thread of Grace

I knew you understood, Schramm thinks in the darkness. The most appalling things can become… just part of the job, and afterward… Christ, there are days when you’re ashamed to be sane. Ah, Renzo, God help us both. Scheisse, we’re a pair.

DIVISIONAL HEADQUARTERS,

12TH WAFFEN-SS WALTHER REINHARDT

PALAZZO USODIMARE, PORTO SANT’ANDREA

Minutes before midnight, Helmut Reinecke lays the last report on Erhardt von Thadden’s desk. “Essentially the same as the first three, Gruppenführer.”

In the past nine hours, four company commanders in widely spaced towns were approached by groups of old women declaring themselves loyal to il Duce, and offering to lead the Germans to partisan hideouts. The Reds were stealing food, the women said. They were interfering with girls. Enough is enough! It’s time for i Tedeschi to impose some order!

The commanders dispatched patrols with these elderly guides into the forested hills flanking Valdottavo’s mountains. Each group was led through a particularly narrow ravine, where they had to string out single file. With gestures and pissing noises, the old crows indicated the need to relieve themselves, then disappeared into the woods. Armed partisans stood up along the ridges. The soldiers were ordered to lay down their arms and strip off their boots and uniforms. Officers resisted in three of four cases. One was killed. Two were injured. The humiliated survivors eventually found their way back to base in their underwear.

Reinecke says, “I wouldn’t have believed it, sir.”

Von Thadden tosses the report aside. “At least Franck’s patrol had the sense to wait until dark to slink back. New orders: every company commander clears his decisions with us.” He rises to study the wall map of Valdottavo, where each partisan action has been marked with a red pin. Harassment, mainly. Petty thievery, mostly from the farmers in the region. Without turning, von Thadden asks his adjutant, “What’s their gambit, Helmut?”

With a single exception, the red dots are just east or west of the San Mauro River. Reinecke leans past von Thadden and taps a finger on the north end of the Valdottavo fu

“Where would you move to respond?”

Reinecke’s finger falls on the railhead. “Borgo San Mauro.”

“No. Choose six villages, three on each side of the river. Hang five men in each. Burn the buildings, confiscate crops and animals.” The Schoolmaster turns on his heel and smiles brightly, though his eyes are red-rimmed with fatigue. “Explain my strategy.”

Reinecke thinks for a moment. “Let the peasants see what happens when they tolerate Communist bandits in their midst. They’ll do our job for us.”

“The partisans may be driven into Valle Stura or Valle San Leandro, and thus…?”

“They’ll become someone else’s problem.”

“Or they’ll concentrate near Borgo San Mauro in the northern end of the valley, where they’ll believe themselves safe. Much easier to deal with when we’re ready.”

Reinecke collects the stack of reports for filing, but he pauses before leaving. “Sir? A

“Go home, Reinecke! And give that baby a kiss from her papa’s boss.”

April 1944

CASA DI GOLETTA

VALDOTTAVO

The work begins with stripping out: an old wall taken down, its stones reserved for later use. Santino Cicala holds each stone in his hand, memorizing its weight and form. Thoughtful, deliberate, he twists left for large ones, right for smaller ones, laying them in a crescent that forms behind him.

Most wallers strip out like bulls pawing the ground, but when Santino apprenticed, his master taught him patience. “Building a wall is like making love to a woman,” he said. “Take your time. Find her rhythm. Hurry, and you’ll botch the job. Dawdle, and you’ll lose it.”

The toolshed was rebuilt before Christmas. Bad weather delayed work on the barn for two months, but the repairs were finished last week. All that’s left is this sheep pen, and Santino will have it done by Easter. Two faces of stone, hearting between, a one-to-twelve taper. Halfway up, a layer of throughs— large stones that bridge the faces and tie the wall together.

Battista Goletta pauses in his own labors to watch Santino study the wall, then bend to select a stone. Hefting it, the Calabrian twists the rock, considering it from all sides, and turns it over again. Bracing the stone against a leather-aproned thigh, he brings the hammer down sharply.

Wiping her gnarled red hands on a faded flowered apron, Rosa crosses the yard to her husband. On Santino’s third rap, the stone fractures along some hidden fault. Remade, it clicks into place between its neighbors on the wall, neat as you please.

“Magic,” Rosa says.

“Hard work,” Battista counters.

When the snow melted and the path to Goletta’s place was clear, Don Leto hiked up the mountainside to see Santino’s work. “You are an artist!” he cried as Santino swept up stone chips and packed them firmly into the hearting of the wall. “Is that to neaten the job site,” the priest asked, “or do you do it for a reason?”

“Both,” Santino said. “Strength comes from the inside— from the inside, not from what you see.”

“And the same is true of people, as I told your ebrea. It’s what’s inside that counts. Of course, it doesn’t hurt for the outside to be beautiful, ne?”

“You found her?” Santino had almost given up hope. The winter, the Germans…

Don Leto pointed across the valley at a hamlet just below the treeline, visible only because the chestnut branches were still bare. “She’s in Santa Chiara. The contadini call her Claudia Fiori. Come to the rectory after Mass on Palm Sunday. I’ll arrange a meeting, but we must be careful.”

“Because of the rastrellamenti?”

“No, the roundups aren’t so bad as they were last autumn, but we have Waffen-SS in the municipal building. Don’t worry. We can manage them.”

Today, sweating in spring sunshine, Santino lays his hammer down and mops his face with a rag. At this pace, he’ll lift four tons of rock by sunset, for two and a half meters of chest-high mortarless wall, topped with a ridge-cap of triangular copestones.

All around him, mountains cleave the air like mauls. Hazelnuts are dropping. Bees hum. Across the valley in Santa Chiara, chestnut trees are in bud.

Battista says you can still get snowstorms this late in the season, but mare’s tail clouds promise good weather for a day or more to come. Santino brushes stone dust from his hands, sucks sweat and blood and powdery lime from a fresh gash in his palm. Three more days, he thinks. And then I’ll see her again.

RECTORY

CHURCH OF SAN MAURO

Adele Toselli has hoarded ingredients for a month. Two turnips, an onion, a potato, a quarter of cabbage. “Three carrots as wrinkled as I am,” she mutters, but it doesn’t matter. Simmer the vegetables with a handful of chickpeas: minestrone. Don Leto has contributed four fresh eggs from three parishioners, and given his own weekly ration of bread. There’s a tin of anchovies in the pantry. Two days ago, the Sant’Andrese priest Osvaldo Tomitz brought early peas from the coast along with money for the Jews. And there’s still a chunk of Parmesan from Stefano Savoca’s last bad-tempered visit.

With the zuppa simmering, she shells the peas, tears most of the bread into small chunks, beats the eggs, mixes it all in a clay pot. With Parmesan grated over the top, and the oven hot, she shoves the casserole in to bake. Sliced onions, spring dandelion leaves, add a little vinegar to the oil from the anchovies. Ecco! Insalata con acciughe.