“Lilla?” he asks once more, as softly as his gravelled tones will allow.
Her head is still buried in her guardian’s bosom; a berth of solace and solidity from which she would happily never depart, but… She turns her head.
“Pipo. Oh, zio Pipo,” she whispers, the light of hope briefly rekindled in her eyes.
“Yes,” is all Pipo Sorbello can think of to say. His expression matches his tone, solicitous and at the same time apprehensive.
“Have you seen papà?”
“Yes.” His eyes fill with tears. He cannot bear the weight of her gaze, so he looks down at his cap which he feeds through his hands as though its rim is a string of rosary beads.
“Oh, Pipo. My poor Pipo,” she whispers.
Like an obstinate child unwanting of support, Lilla tries to shrug off the binding arms of her comforter.
Mrs Robertson, though, will not release her. She studies Lilla for a second, before sensing from her some reassurance that she will neither charge into her parent’s house nor descend into unrestrained hysteria.
Lilla raises her arms and steps towards her father’s old friend.
However, before she can drape the limbs of her compassion around him, Pipo steps back, holding up his hand to ward Lilla off. “No. Please. I am not deserving of your sympathy. Concettina and I, we both escaped. I don’t know how. Maybe it is because we did not have children to think of. Perhaps that is why we ran when the trembling stopped. Perhaps because we ran, this is why I feel so guilty, so ashamed…”
Mrs Robertson makes to speak, but Lilla glances and shakes her head.
This time, and so that he cannot refuse her consolation without some more physical objection that might risk causing her offence, Lilla steps towards him more quickly. She places her hands gently on the corners of his shoulders and, furrowing her brow, looks Pipo deeply in his eyes.
And as her own tears trickle down her reddened cheeks, she says, “There is no shame in wanting to live, zio Pipo. We must not feel guilty because we have been spared. These decisions… They are not ours to make. Now, tell me where does my father lie?”
Pipo Sorbello nods, a tear drops from his eyes and splashes on his shoe. He half turns and points down towards the beach. “He is there, at the water’s edge. He is with the young boys from next door; with Gaetano and Rosario. When the wave came, they must have been trying to move the boat and by the time it reached our house, and you know where we live, much higher up, it was unthinkable, the size: it was a wall of water taller than the doors of the Duomo. People down here, they never stood a chance.” He hangs his head on her shoulder and cries.
They stand, cold in a squall of the heaven’s tears, and Lilla murmurs, “Cry, zio Pipo. Cry, as the whole of Messina is crying.”
Chapter 13
“You were fortunate not to be with your parents,” Mrs Robertson says.
They are walking, or rather navigating their way deftly between the crevasses splitting the surface and the ruin of bricks and broken wood piled in the road.
“Fortunate. That is not how I would describe my situation,” Lilla replies, disconsolately. “Perhaps, like zio Pipo, the Madonna della Lettera has been watching over me.”
“Your uncle, eh? Here, take my hand.” In the face of her exertions, Mrs Robertson blows a little. “I’ll pull you up. That’s it. Up you come. I mean…” she adds, before moving on to the next obstacle. “I mean, normally you would have been at home and, if you had been you would not be here with me now. Surely that is good fortune, Lilla.”
“Yes, Mrs Robertson. But is it good fortune or did our Madonna lead me away from the house knowing she would save me? When our forefathers went with Saint Paul to Palestine to ask the Madonna for her blessing, didn’t she send them back with a letter giving us her blessing and promising us her protection? Well,” she scoffs, angrily, “where is her protection now and why has she watched over me and forgotten my family?”
“That’s not ours to question, Lilla. We must not doubt our path. The Lord moves in mysterious ways His wonders to perform and if your young man hadn’t told you to meet him on the front, you likely as not wouldn’t be here. Just as if those sailors from that ship hadn’t found you, you would have died of exposure by now. Ours is not to reason His wonders; ours is simply to do His bidding.”
As they pass the wrecked houses, many of the façades torn off as though their builders had simply neglected to face them, they hear moans and groans. They stop to listen and occasionally they call out and wait for a response, but when none comes, they move on.
“There are more people about now,” Mrs Robertson observes. “Some of these men, they’re not from here: they’re blond and look strong: northern or eastern. Not people from Sicily, I don’t think.”
“What language are they speaking?” Lilla asks, pausing for a moment.
“Not sure as I can hear them. Might be Russian. Didn’t you say you’d seen a Russian flag on one of those enormous warships.”
In what is left of the once proud Via San Camillo, men in blue jackets are busy clearing rubble. One turns and shouts in their direction, but as he does so the world begins to tremble and roar once more.
“Lilla,” Mrs Robertson shouts, reaching out to grab hold of her young companion. “Quick. Come here. To the middle of the street.”
However, as she takes a step, Lilla is suddenly bounced up and down, one second like the tip of a stick on a snare drum, the next as though she has been kicked by the pedal of a base. She screams and falls to the ground.
Somehow, the older lady falls in her direction and the two cling to each other.
Debris crashes down from the buildings and there is little they can do other than sit and wait and hope the masonry lands elsewhere other than on top of them.
Even though the aftershock lasts no more than a few seconds, the turmoil beneath them, the roaring in their ears and the crashing all around them seems interminable.
“Are we going to die?” she asks.
“Close your eyes and hold me, Lilla. Just hold me tight and wait. It will stop in a minute; it has to.”
When the trembling ceases and the dust settles, Mrs Robertson gets to her feet and pulls her young charge up with her. The Via San Camillo appears the same, except that some of the piles of debris are now taller than they had been but a few moments before.
The men who had been clearing the rubble are gathered together in a huddle, patting themselves down and wiping the dirt from their eyes.
Mrs Robertson looks to Lilla like a ghost, as though she has rolled in a basin of flour; and yet apart from her altered appearance she seems relatively unperturbed by her experience.
“I beg your pardon,” she shouts back at the man. “I didn’t hear you. What did you say?”
The man separates himself from his party and wanders over. “I’m sorry, I don’t speak Italian,” he says in English.
“That’s perfectly all right,” Mrs Robertson replies in the same. “I do, even though I am British. What do you want?”
His face is spattered with soot, his fingers raw from tearing at the bricks and he recoils at her brusque tone. “British, eh?” he says. “Well, what the bloody hell are you doing wandering about Messina? Not exactly Sunday promenade at Brighton Pavilion is it?”
His humour lost on Mrs Robertson, she turns her nose up at him.
“Joking apart,” he continues, “You shouldn’t be here; these aftershocks will likely as not bring the rest of the city down. Shouldn’t you be at the harbour trying to get a boat out?”
“Yes, probably we should,” Mrs Robertson replies. “But no, we won’t be. This young lady’s friend might be buried in the ruins of a house; we’re going to see if there’s anything we can do.”
“Well, I don’t know whether that’s brave or just plain foolhardy. Never mind the danger from the aftershocks bringing
down the already unstable buildings, I hear the Cappuccini jail has been destroyed and all the criminals escaped. Caught a bunch of them red–handed trying to break open the vault at the depository. Just thought you ought to know, that’s all. Just you be careful. Where did you say you were going?”
“I didn’t. We are going to the Via dei Templari. It’s up beneath the San Gregorio, two streets across from here. Can you come and help?”
The man scratches his head in thought, turns to glance at his working party and replies, “No, not while we’ve got our hands full here.”
“What about others?” Mrs Robertson asks, as though there should by rights be a queue of workmen waiting for instruction.
“People arriving all the time, Mrs. Be better in the morning.”
“Why are there so few of you? I thought there’d be more. It would appear the authorities have been rather slow to react. Or perhaps it is that they don’t care what happens to the people of Messina?”
He scratches his head again, inspects his bloodied hands and sighs. “It’s not that, I’m sure; it’s more that nobody knew what was going on here. The telegraph office is completely destroyed and what with the signal towers either side of the Strait being down, the Marconi radio isn’t working either. Turns out the rest of the world didn’t find out what was going on here until an Italian torpedo boat fetched up in Naples last night.”
“And you can’t spare us even a little time?”
“Wish I could. Wish I could. Trouble is we’re a bit taken up with searching for Captain Passino of the Piemonte. Turns out he was ashore on Sunday night and hasn’t been seen since. This is his house… Or was,” he adds, as an afterthought.
“How can you expect to find anyone alive in that?” Mrs Robertson asks, pointing at the tumbled remains.
“I expect the same can be said of wherever it is you’re going. Look,” he says, sympathetically, “it’s really not safe for you to be here. Why don’t you count your blessings and get out of the city? Forget Messina, the city is no more.”
Chapter 14
If he didn’t already know it is impossible, Enzo would be minded to think time is standing still. And how does he know it is impossible? For the simple reason that he has wished it before and it has never happened.
Whenever he was in Lilla’s company, he would wish it. Oh, how he would wish it with all his heart! And he would imagine how fantastic it would be to have the power to halt the world in its turning so that he could preserve the joy of her.
Now, though, the world seems to have ceased both its turning and its trembling, and it is suspended in its misery just as he is suspended in his.
“Another shake like that, Enzo,” he mutters to himself, “and your teeth will be jump out from your jaw. Surely, there can’t be any more beams left to fall.”
He opens his eyes, slowly, fearing that all he will see is more rubble cementing him in the darkness of his tomb.
But wait! Though his sight is bleary, his eyes painful and his eyelids glued gritty and shut at the corners, there is light. And, no longer is the light the threatening yellow of flame; it is the grey light of day, the light of a dawn mist on the Strait, a light which promises.
Enzo’s spirits soar, bubbles of excitement and expectation coursing up through his muscles. He tries to stand and while his torso obeys his command, his legs don’t.
“Oh yes,” he says, “my legs. How stupid of me!”
Yet the fact that he can see a sizeable triangle of sky above fills him with hope.
“Hello,” he shouts. “Is there anyone there? Please, come help me. I am down here, in the cellar.”
He listens.
Nothing.
“Hello. Help me, please. Help me.” Enzo shouts again and again, and he shouts until he can no longer hear himself shouting and his voice grows weak.
And still no one comes.
His mouth is dry and he is wickedly thirsty. Yet there is good news, because for the first time in as many hours as he has forgotten, Enzo realises that he now has sufficient light by which to fully appreciate his surroundings.
What he sees, though, does not fill him with any great relief.
The beam pinning down his legs is so broad and heavy that it will require more than a few strong men to shift it, and the cellar, too, is almost full of rubble. Almost, because here and there small pockets of irregularly shaped cavities have been protected by masonry and beams that have fallen and now lean against the walls at varying angles.
He twists his upper body to look behind him and immediately wishes he hadn’t, as a stinging pain shoots up from his hips into his chest.
Enzo swears under his breath. However, his oath soon mutates into a fit of hysterical giggles as he also realises that though he needs water, what he has glimpsed behind him might, for the moment, suffice.
He reaches up over his head and touches the round, cold glass of a bottle.
“So, papà” he mutters, “you may have buried me, but at least you have buried me near your wine. And look here! What have we here?” Within reach to his right hangs a pair of fat salami and, on a shelf dropped at one end, two loaves of bread.
He eases the bottle from behind his neck and holds it before him, studying intently the amber liquid as if it holds within its flavours the very essence of life.
Enzo sinks his teeth into the cork and pulls the bottle. At first the stopper squeaks and resists, but after a good deal of coaxing, it slips out with an exquisite pop.
“Steady now, you fool. Remember how strong this is? Can’t have you getting drunk, now can we?” And a second fit of hysterical giggles consumes him and immediately reproduces the pain in his hips.
When the pain has subsided, he raises the lip of the bottle to his own and–
“Hello? Is there anyone down there?”
Enzo is dreaming, surely? He is dehydrated, that’s for sure; so perhaps now that he is so close to some relieving liquid, his mind is playing tricks on him.
He lowers the bottle and inspects it further. There is nothing strange about it; it is simply a bottle of Malvasia. He raises it again, sticking his lips out towards the bottle in pleasant anticipation.
Enzo sips. Nectar! Freshness. A spring afternoon in an orchard: he is lying on a bed of apricots and acacia blossoms, and the air is thick with the perfume of ripe fruit and honey and–
“Hello? I said, is there anyone down there?”
He splutters. He coughs. He wheezes, wipes a dribble of wine from his mouth and winces at the cost of his exertions.
“Yes. Yes, I am here. Is there anyone there?”
The man above shouts, “Of course there is someone here, you idiot. If I wasn’t here, I wouldn’t be calling down to see if anyone was down there.” His voice is gruff, uncultured and his tone sarcastic.
“Can you help me?” Enzo asks in a polite yet insistent tone.
“Of course,” comes the response. “I am not trapped like you and if you were not trapped down there, you would not need my help. Of course, I can help.”
“So, help me, please. But be careful where you put your feet; if you bring any more of the house down on top of me, I’ll never get out. Are you alone, or are there others with you?”
A silence extends, as though the man is either counting the number of his companions so as to be accurate in his reply or–
“There are enough here to get you out of your coffin. Tell me, young man, what is your name?”
The prospect of his rescue triggers a wave of relief, which sweeps through his mind, chasing all caution from his thinking.
“I am Enzo Ruggeri. I am the son of Don Carmelo Ruggeri. You may know him… in the harbour, he–”
“Yes, I have heard of him. Big man, eh, your father? Is he down there with you?”
“No, I don’t know where he is. He’s probably out there looking for
me.” Enzo reconsiders for a moment. “No, on second thoughts he probably isn’t. Forget I said that.”
“I’m going to lower you a rope,” the gravel–voiced man offers. “Do you have any money down there with you? Is there a safe in the house? Is it in the cellar?”
“Money?” Enzo repeats, baffled. “What has money got to do with you helping free a man who is imprisoned?”
“Well,” the man scoffs, as though humouring an audience, “a man does not get drunk on gratitude alone. Do you have any money? Come on, boy, do not play games with me; your situation is far worse than mine.”
“If I have no money, if there is no safe, what will you do, leave me down here? Surely any reasonable man will not leave another to die in such circumstances.”
“What?” the invisible man screams as though a heavy weight has suddenly fallen on his foot. “You expect reason in the middle of this lunacy? Ha, if you have no money, then expect to stay where you are and good luck to you.”
Enzo is perplexed if not insulted by the man’s lack of compassion. Yet he understands that, like those he has loaded holds with, many men are like donkeys in that they refuse to take a step forward unless offered an incentive.
“No, I have no money,” he replies, “I have something far more valuable.”
“Oh yes, and what might that be?”
“I have a bottle of Malvasia, a little bread and some salami. Have you not thought that perhaps food will be more valuable than money in the coming days?”
The silence suggests the man is weighing up the potential of Enzo’s offer.
“It is a good point, you make, young Ruggeri, but it is not enough. Do you have a cross and chain around your neck? Perhaps a ring or two?”
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