by James R Benn
“Ivan saric,” Kaz said. “He’s the bishop who writes horrible poetry, isn’t he?”
“He butchers both words and people,” Randic said.
“Yeah, he runs the Catholic newspapers in Sarajevo, so he can print whatever he wants. Poems about the magnificence of Hitler, about money-grubbing Jews, the joy of forced conversions of Serbians-all terrible stuff,” Hamilton said.
“And your Pope, Mr. Boyle, he does nothing about it. The Ustashi murder thousands, the archbishop sings their praises, and the Pope lets Paveli? kiss his ring. But they send you to Rome because one priest is murdered. Ha! What can a man do but drink?”
“Zeveli,” I said as the vessel picked up speed and began a gentle, rhythmic roll.
“I do not like boats,” Kaz said, staggering from the room.
CHAPTER NINE
Kaz didn’t like boats all the way to Pescara. The wind kicked up about an hour out, as darkness settled in and clouds covered the stars. Kaz spent most of the night above deck, leaning over the side, moaning when he wasn’t cursing in Polish. As we neared the German-occupied shore near Pescara, the crew helped him change out of his soaked uniform and into his priestly garments. By then he felt well enough to give his Webley revolver to Randic, telling him he hoped he killed a good number of “god-damn” Ustashi with it. This gesture endeared him to the Partisans, who laughed, clapped him on the shoulder, and gave many Serbian well wishes for our safety. Even green at the gills, Kaz showed his knack for getting along with all sorts of people.
With the first glimmer of false dawn lighting the horizon to the east, a small boat rowed us ashore, Hamilton at the bow, Thompson submachine gun at the ready. The crew paddled into a small bay and brought the boat up onto a shingle beach, each wave rolling stones and pebbles, creating a cascade of sound that muffled the splashing of the oars and whispered commands. They beached the boat and Hamilton motioned us to stay put as they jumped out and pulled it onto dry land.
“Don’t get your feet wet,” he whispered as we got out, holding our long cassocks up like ladies at a garden party. “The Krauts at the train station might take notice.”
“Okay,” I said. “Where are the men we’re meeting?”
“Right there,” Hamilton said, pointing down the beach, about ten yards away. Two men, dressed in nondescript uniforms with rifles pointed in our general direction, had appeared from nowhere. “Good luck.”
“Same to you in Yugoslavia,” I said. We shook hands, and in seconds he was gone as the boat slid back into the water. Our new guides motioned for us to follow. We did, our shoes crunching on smooth, round stones worn down by the sea.
A hundred yards from the beach, we came to a rough track where a mule cart was waiting. An old woman dressed in typical peasant black from head to foot sat with the reins in her hands. She did not look at the two men, or at Kaz and me. They gestured for us to get in the back, and by the time we were seated, they were gone. The woman snapped the reins and the mule plodded forward.
“Buongiorno, signora,” Kaz said. She ignored us as we sat facing each other, our cheap suitcases on our laps, phony papers in our coat pockets, and a pallor to Kaz’s cheeks. The cart trundled along, the early morning sun warming our faces. It was eerie, this sensation of falseness, everything about our identities a lie, every lie necessary to keep us alive. Armed only with disguise, from the clothing labels in our overcoats to the two-day-old newspaper from Rimini in the north, we had placed our lives in the hands of a silent old woman in a mule cart. At least our shoes were dry.
An hour later, we reached the outskirts of Pescara, which by wartime standards was unlucky enough to have a harbor, a main coastal road, and a railroad intersecting near the town center. It had evidently been recently hit by air raids. Rubble lined the roads, and some gutted buildings stood open, with floors of masonry, furniture, and the debris of families and businesses spilling into the street. Civilians, mostly women, were working at the bombed-out structures, stacking bricks with that click-clack sound I’d heard so many times before, the sound of life attempting to assert itself in the face of destruction. Around the corner, a church presented a gaping wound, the roof and side caved in, the altar exposed to the elements. The front wall was still intact, but the main doors had been blown off. Above the shards of wood, carved into a limestone lintel, it read Chiesa del Rosario. Church of the Rosary.
As we neared the railroad station, I saw where all the male civilians had gone. German troops guarded work gangs of Italian men and boys repairing damage to the rail line. Some were in coveralls, others labored in suits and white shirts caked with dirt and sweat. The Germans must have picked them right off the street and brought them here to fill in craters and get the rail bed back in shape. The air was filled with thick, gritty dust. Men looked up for a moment as we passed, and then bent back to their shovels and pickaxes, casting wary eyes at their overseers.
The mule cart stopped as we neared the station. We got off and Kaz thanked the woman, who, true to form, said nothing and urged her mule on. Probably best not to get involved with the passengers in her business.
Trees had once lined the road where it passed the train station. Now there were ruined limbs, blasted trunks, and a bomb crater filled with mud. The windows of the station were shattered, but other than that it was still standing. Good news, if you didn’t count the German guards at the door and along the platform. We had nowhere to go but forward. I clutched my suitcase, put one foot in front of the other, and prayed.
“Dokumente,” the first guard said. We handed them over. He looked at Kaz’s first, checked a list on a clipboard, and handed them back with a curt nod. As soon as he looked at mine, he called for his Leutnant.
“Irischer Burger,” he said, handing the papers over to the officer. I figured it wasn’t every day an Irishman got on a train in Pescara, so I wasn’t worried. Not much, anyway. He studied the identity papers and the travel documents from the Holy See.
“You are on Vatican business?” the officer said in clipped, precise English.
“Aye, that I am,” I said, laying on the accent. “Seeing to the refugees up north, not to mention those right here. Was it the damn English who did this? They destroyed the Church of the Rosary, did you see, man?”
“Yes, it must have been the Englanders. Only the British bomb at night.”
“Cowards that they are,” I said.
“You are on your way back to Rome?”
“Yes, Father Dalakis and I are returning from an inspection of the refugee centers in the north. As you can see,” I said with a smile, pointing to the letters, which were written out in German and Italian.
“What was it like?” he asked.
“Up north? As you’d expect. Many families separated, not enough food, churches packed with refugees. And the bombings, by all the saints, it’s terrible,” I said, crossing myself at the invocation.
“Suchen Sie ihr Gepack,” he said to the guard, who took our suitcases and opened them. “My apologies, Fathers, but we have captured a number of saboteurs in clever disguises. There are also many prisoners of war on the loose, since the Italians surrendered, all trying to make their way to Rome. This is simply routine.”
It was. Underwear, socks, a clean shirt, a Bible, and that two-day-old newspaper from Rimini. The officer looked at the newspaper and nodded to the guard, who stepped back.
“All is in order,” he said. “You may take your bags.”
I felt a flood of relief and hoped it didn’t show. A priest in my position would be used to this by now. Exasperated, maybe, but not relieved. We closed up the suitcases, ready to buy our tickets.
“One more question, please,” the officer said as we began to walk away. I remembered what Kaz had said about the Gestapo. They’d treat you nicely as first, to soften you up, then hit you hard. I felt my hand shake and put it in my pocket, another nonchalant traveler with a suitcase and a train to catch.
“Certainly, Leutnant,” Kaz said. I tried to look bored.<
br />
“You came from Rimini by train?”
“Aye,” I said. “And points north.”
“Then please explain how you got through. Ancona was heavily bombed for the last two nights. There have been no trains.”
My mind went numb. Was this what Diana had felt? Cornered, outsmarted, with nowhere to hide? I stood, unable to speak, hoping the pounding in my chest couldn’t be heard as thoughts of Gestapo kitchens ran through my mind.
“You are misinformed, Leutnant,” Kaz said with certainty. I broke out in a sweat, and worked to keep from looking around for a place to run to. For a second, I couldn’t catch my breath until I realized I was holding it. “We visited the Duomo there. Do you know that cathedral is almost a thousand years old? It is magnificent.” Kaz chattered on about the architecture until the officer waved us along, bored with the recitation.
“Kaz,” I whispered as we entered the station. “How were you so sure about the railroad?”
“It was obviously a trick,” he said. “And if it wasn’t, we were dead men anyway, so why not?”
“It wasn’t obvious to me.”
“Father Boyle,” Kaz said in a low voice. “If the rail line had been cut between here and Rimini, how did Hamilton get the newspaper in your suitcase?”
“Bless you, Father Dalakis, that was quick thinking,” I said, giving Kaz his due.
It should have been obvious to me. Not only the newspaper, but the interrogation technique. It didn’t matter that we’d come in on the train as we’d said. The Leutnant was looking for a reaction, that flicker of guilt that gives a liar away when he’s been found out. And I almost gave it to him. I should have picked up on it, but my mind had gone right to Diana and what she must’ve gone through. I needed to get my wits about me and focus on getting to Rome, not to mention avoiding the Gestapo kitchens.
I listened to Kaz get our tickets and heard the cities named along the way. From Pescara to L’Aquila, then Terni, then Viterbo. He paid with a wad of lira, and we sat on hard wooden benches, waiting for our train. I practiced not thinking about Diana. It didn’t go well.
CHAPTER TEN
We didn’t talk much. Speaking in English was bound to attract attention, and whispering in English was likely to draw fire. The train was packed with a mix of civilians, Kraut soldiers, and Italians in the uniform of the Republican National Guard, the militia that stayed loyal to Mussolini after he was deposed and rescued by the Germans. Those were just the passengers. German military police walked through the cars at every stop, but they were more interested in their own troops, probably on the lookout for deserters. Our white collars seemed to make us invisible, two meek priests amidst uniforms and weapons of war. I tried to sleep, but the train rattled and rolled so much it was impossible. The locomotive chugged along, slowly, up steep mountain passes and through long tunnels carved out of rock.
I figured any good priest might read the Bible, so I took the one out of my suitcase. I had my own back home, of course, but I’d never actually read it. I skipped all the begats and tried to find the stories, the kind I remembered from Sunday school, anything to pass the time and look the part. It was in Acts that I stumbled across the tale of the Apostle Paul, who came to Rome to preach the new religion.
And when we came to Rome, the centurion delivered the prisoners to the captain of the guard… after three days Paul called the chief of the Jews together: and when they were come together, he said unto them, Men and brethren, though I have committed nothing against the people, or customs of our fathers, yet was I delivered prisoner from Jerusalem into the hands of the Romans.
“Kaz,” I said in a low voice. “Do you know what happened to Paul the Apostle?” He drew a finger across his throat. I shut the book and closed my eyes.
As night fell, blackout curtains were drawn and the lights dimmed. We ate the bread and cheese that had been packed for us, and shared a bottle of wine with no label. The air in the car was thick with tobacco smoke, the smell of stale food, and unwashed bodies. I prayed for sleep, and awoke hours later with a stiff neck and Kaz asleep on my shoulder. The conductor walked through, unleashing a string of Italian in a bored monotone.
“We are almost to Terni, Father Boyle,” Kaz said. “The train will stop for one hour.”
“Shall we stretch our legs then, Father Dalakis?” I said, putting on the brogue. By this time, the two odd priests were old hat to the other travelers, and as we stood, one departing German soldier gave us an “Auf Wiedersehen.”
In the station we found a bar serving coffee, and ordered “Due espressi, per favore.” As we sipped the bitter drink-no sugar to be had-two trucks pulled up outside and German soldiers piled out. For a moment I thought we were in trouble, but then I saw the medics, with their white helmets and big red crosses. They were unloading wounded, a few walking, most on stretchers. Kaz raised an eyebrow to let me know he was relieved as well. Some of the bandages were soaked with fresh blood; something had happened to these men not too far from here, and I hoped it wouldn’t stir up security. As we finished our espressos and left the bar, a German officer ran up to us. From the look on his face, it wasn’t to ask for our papers. His uniform was dark with soot, one arm bloodstained, and the blood didn’t seem to be his. He was wild-eyed, as if he might be in shock.
“Bitte, Vater, werden Sie einem sterbenden Soldaten letzte Riten geben? Er ist katholisch.”
“Letzte Riten? Ja, sicher,” Kaz said. “Father Boyle, one of his men requires last rites. Would you like to perform the sacrament? Er ist Irischer,” he added, for the benefit of the officer, a captain.
I understood from the look in Kaz’s eyes that he had no idea what to do. But I did, having seen police chaplains give emergency last rites to cops a couple of times, not that I was taking notes.
“Yes, of course, Father Dalakis. Take me to the poor boy.” The captain looked confused for a moment, but recovered quickly. He nodded and we followed him to the sidewalk where the wounded were laid out. The dying soldier was obvious. A kid set apart from the others, a medic at his side, holding a bloody compress to his chest. The captain knelt by him.
“Hans, Hans,” he said, squeezing the boy’s hand. Hans opened his eyes, his straw-colored hair splashed across his forehead. His eyes were crystal blue, and seemed to be looking at something far, far away. I didn’t want to do this, but I couldn’t say no. It didn’t seem right, since only a priest could perform the sacrament. But Hans was dying, and he’d never know the difference.
“I have no holy oil,” I said to Kaz. I heard Kaz whispering to the captain, hopefully a story that would hold up. I was glad he didn’t let Hans hear. I got down on my knees, took Hans’s hand from the captain, and laid both of my hands on them, just as I’d seen Father Kearny do back in Boston.
“Vater?” Hans gasped. The captain said something reassuring, and Hans focused on me. With each breath, a thin, pink bubble formed on his lips, then burst. His eyes widened, waiting for me to perform the blessing. He gasped in pain as he fumbled at his neck and held up a small medal. Saint George, the patron saint of soldiers, the slayer of dragons. He kissed it, and I struggled to remember the words I needed to say, hoping they’d give comfort, and not betray my falseness.
“Through this holy unction may the Lord pardon thee, whatever sins or faults thou hast committed. Thus do I commend thee into the arms of our Lord.” The benediction flowed without thought, from that place where I kept all things holy, memories of what I had been taught about goodness before I learned evil. I laid Hans’s hands, still clutching the medal, high on his chest, above the bandage. His breath was ragged and his eyes desperate. He knew he was about to die. I touched both his hands with two fingers, then his forehead, just as Father Kearny would have anointed him with oil. He took hold of my hand, both of his hands bloody from his wound, as tears fell across his cheeks. He was a boy, but old enough to kill and be killed in turn. I leaned in close to his ear, and whispered a fragment of a prayer that had always stayed with me. “Ma
y He, the true shepherd, recognize you as one of his own. Amen.”
Hans squeezed my hand, and with a rattle of breath from his lungs, let go. I leaned back, aware of a circle of soldiers around me, their heads bowed. I was in the presence of mine enemies, as the old psalm said, walking through the valley of the shadow of death. I unclenched Hans’s hand from mine and stood. The captain took my hands and poured water from a canteen over them, washing away the sticky blood, perhaps my falseness too, but certainly not my sins. “Danke sehr,” he said.
“I am sorry,” I said, and could not look him in the eye. I had probably committed a sin against the clergy and church, if not God himself. Maybe Hans would put in a good word for me.
Kaz took me by the arm and turned me toward the train. No reason to linger, he was right. We hadn’t gone ten steps when the captain called out to us, “Moment!” He pointed to us, and two soldiers led by a sergeant trotted our way, rifles at the ready. Kaz and I looked at each other, wondering how we’d given ourselves away and what to do. If we ran, they’d cut us down in seconds.
“Komm,” the sergeant said, motioning us to follow him to the train. We trailed him, the two others on either side of us. The platform was full, lines of soldiers and civilians waiting to board the train. The sergeant pushed his way through with a ruthlessness that spared no one. Angry shouts went up, but no one in the crowd objected to the small formation. At the door to our railcar, we saw the holdup. Several SS men in gray dress uniforms were questioning everyone boarding the train, checking identity papers and consulting clipboards with long lists of names.
Our sergeant spoke to the SS men and in no time an argument erupted. I glanced at Kaz, but this was no time to ask for a translation. Behind us, more shouts broke out, and I saw the wounded from the trucks being led toward the train. The lead SS guy was yelling something at the sergeant, his hand on the pistol in his holster. That was a mistake, since the sergeant held a Schmeisser MP-40 submachine at the ready and had a squad of men on the way. He and the other soldiers pushed the security detail aside and waved the wounded and their medics on board. There was a lot of indignant shouting, but the SS knew they were outnumbered, and by actual combat soldiers at that. They retreated to a corner of the platform and glared at everyone who looked their way, lighting cigarettes and shaking their heads.
