The Secret of Altamura: Nazi Crimes, Italian Treasure

by Dick Rosano

  Through instructions from her priest, Sofina had come to understand some of the words on the scroll, but only enough of the ancient language to appreciate what she – now he – held in their hands.

  Repeating his mother's words rather than translating them himself, Nino said, “This is the true Gospel of Matthias, a disciple of Jesus, who walked with Him for many years, and who was adopted as an apostle by Jesus' closest followers after His death.”

  When their Lord was taken prisoner and then crucified, many of the disciples fled, fearing for their lives. Judas was called out as the traitor, but he hanged himself from a barren tree on the plains around Jerusalem. Even Peter, the leader of the disciples, denied the Lord three times when questioned by the soldiers.

  It was an ancient text from the first century of Christianity, written by Matthias just a few years after Jesus lived, decades earlier than the other gospels, by someone who knew Jesus intimately while He was still on earth.

  Matthias remained true to his Lord, escaping the grasp of the authorities and refusing to deny the divine promise of the sainted man. He had been a prophet and the gentle people of this land had waited many years for His coming, and Matthias was not going to be the one to turn on Him.

  Matthias had followed Jesus through the fields, villages, and cities. “He heard His speeches firsthand,” Sofina had told Nino, “and watched the glow of redemption come over the faces of the people He addressed.” Matthias had firsthand knowledge of Jesus' meaning and His intent, so he was the natural choice of the apostles to join their band and spread the teachings throughout the region and the world following the crucifixion.

  When the disciples emerged from hiding, they decided to carry on the teachings of their Lord. And Matthias, the most steadfast among them, was allowed to join them in their crusade. He was the most educated of the disciples and persisted in taking notes of the Lord's teachings and the sermons that he gave throughout Palestine. It was by Matthias's hand that the disciples expected to chronicle the life of this holiest of men, the prophet who had brought them hope.

  This text, the words revealed on the papyrus in Nino's hands, recounted the experiences and teachings of Jesus while he was still alive, spoken in the exact words of Matthias, as passed down to his grandson Jacob who wrote the words upon this sheet. Nino had asked his mother about the papyrus, and she told him that there have been legends about the lost Gospel of Matthias for many centuries, but few scholars believed that it actually existed.

  This was that gospel, but translated in the hand of Matthias' grandson, and it had been lost for nearly two thousand years until an unknown pilgrim brought it to Altamura during the war. Don Daniele had asked where it came from, but the dark-skinned and hooded pilgrim was terse.

  “Keep it safe, padre,” the pilgrim whispered. He looked only once into the priest's eyes, then turned and vanished into the crowd.

  Matthias was zealous about his responsibility. He wrote down as much as he could of his Lord's words and parables, and rendered this into a long narrative of the life that had rescued true believers from darkness.

  Nino remembered his mother's fervent recitation of the passages that she could recall from the priest's teaching. How the words of Matthias told of lives and truths that Jesus meant when He still spoke as a man, as the living Son of God, before His death and resurrection. It was Matthias, through his grandson Jacob's careful copying, that the true, direct words of Jesus could be read.

  Nino knew all this only from his mother's telling, since he couldn't translate the words himself. Holding the fragments of papyrus gently in his big hands, Nino wept. He knew that this possession was worth more than any relic on earth, but that he could not let anyone know about it. He also knew from the translated passages that the sainted man, called Lord by Matthias, was not the son of God as many have claimed since that time. To expose the existence of the Gospel of Matthias would be to deny the divinity of Jesus and probably lead to the destruction of the parchment.

  After pausing in reverence, Nino refolded the fragments into the protecting cloth and thence into the stone box, and lifted it carefully back into its resting place in the earthen wall of this cavern. Then he carefully repacked the earth around it, and climbed the ladder back out of the space.

  Chapter 59

  Staying True to Altamura

  The people of Altamura saved Marisa's life, in more than simply physical ways. They took her in after she shot Anselm Bernhard, hid her from the ragtag remnants of German soldiers straggling back from the battlefields who would have taken her into custody. They even hid her from the Americans to avoid complications and questions that might have made Marisa's life more difficult.

  Hiding a Venetian woman in the Mezzogiorno shouldn't have been so easy. Northerners have a lighter complexion and, if that didn't give her away, her dialect would have. There is very little correspondence between the Italian language spoken in Venice and that spoken in the south, but the Allied soldiers didn't know that.

  So Marisa blended in and made her home in Altamura. When the war was winding down and some of the Italian soldiers were returning to their hometowns, a young sergeant named Guido Valcone came back to Altamura. His body was broken in ways that would never heal, and his spirit had been shaken, but standing in the shadow of the Chiesa dello Spirito Santo lifted him up.

  “My broken arm will still serve me well, and this limp is just a reminder of our sacrifice,” he said. “But my heart and soul belong here.”

  Soon, the people of Altamura put Marisa and Guido Valcone together, sensing that both of them needed someone, and that pairing those shaken by war tragedies was God's plan.

  Marisa married Guido not long afterward and bore three children who were healthy and happy in this tiny town in the Mezzogiorno.

  Guido told his children about the war, about the suffering, and about his trials at the front. But Marisa would never share any of her experiences with them. She remained ashamed of how she had cornered Anselm Bernhard, but fiercely proud that she had avenged her sister, Alessia.

  The Valcone family grew up in Altamura, as Guido and Marisa worked with the villagers to rebuild the war torn region.

  Chapter 60

  So Soon, Too Soon

  “You're leaving,” said Arabella. It was a question but sounded more like a certainty.

  “Yes,” replied Carlo, “to St. Louis.”

  “What's the name of your saint, the church you attend in St. Louis?”

  “Saint Ambrose.”

  “Well,” Arabella said with some resolve, fighting back the tears. “I will pray to Sant' Ambrose to keep you well.”

  She tried to stay resolute, but couldn't help adding, “and that he might bring you back to me one day.”

  They looked at each other with both love and sympathy. Carlo knew that he would not be returning, at least not to live there. Altamura was a wonderful town and he had come to know more about his Italianism in this village, including the vast difference between being an Italian and being an Italian-American. But that epiphany was telling him to go home, to be with his family, to carry on the culture and traditions of Italy, to cherish his parents, aunts, uncles, and cousins. And the siblings that he missed so much.

  Like Arabella, he had grown up in a culture where food, wine, and big family gatherings were the norm. With aunts pinching cheeks and uncles wrapping the kids in bear hugs, there was always music, laughter, and tight family connections.

  Some traditions were taken directly from the old country, especially the food that was closely reminiscent of southern Italy's best. Carlo had even helped some Italian neighbors on The Hill in St. Louis stomp the grapes and make wine in just the manner that Cristiano did in Altamura. Now, with more knowledge of breadbaking rituals, he knew that he could turn out loaves to match those of Zia Filomena – if he only could find a stone oven.

  But not every Italian tradition survived in America.

  He looked at Arabella again, imagining having children with her
, but although they honored similar traditions, they came from different worlds.

  With tears staining her cheeks, Arabella stood resolutely before Carlo. She was fighting against giving in to sadness or longing, but he was willing to cross the space between them.

  Taking Arabella in his arms, Carlo kissed her and whispered in her ear.

  Chapter 61

  Too Long, Too Lonely

  Carlo left Arabella that day and he shared a loving goodbye meal with his host family that evening.

  He left Altamura the next day. He would never know what became of Arabella, if she ever married or had children. But he thought of her often.

  He drove his rental car back to Bari, turned it in, and boarded a train for Rome. The hours rolled by as the train rumbled across the land, passing from the arid reaches of the Mezzogiorno to the more fertile landscape of central Italy.

  Carlo arrived in Rome on the day before his flight back to the United States. He stayed at the same hotel he had used weeks before, and wandered off into the afternoon sunshine as he had done that day upon arriving in the Eternal City.

  It's true what Arabella and Gia said about Americans, Carlo thought. “We have so much, it's easy to wave off the experiences of the past.” The southern Italians, the people who lived on land that had been invaded and occupied by so many cultures over the centuries, could not as easily dismiss those events as worthy only of the history books. They still lived them today.

  Was that good, he wondered? If the people of Altamura had more of what the Americans enjoyed, would they turn away from re-living the past and live in the present? Would that even be the best thing?

  Carlo walked past monuments and fountains in the streets of Rome that had stood for centuries. The faces on the sculpted monoliths looked just like the faces of the people sitting at the cafés. The ruins of the city center, including the Forum, had not been paved over for a high-rise office building. These ruins stood there because they were still there. Because Romans – and Italians – don't discard the past or pretend it didn't happen.

  He sat down at a café and ordered a Campari and soda. The rustic wines of the south were appropriate in the simple life in the Mezzogiorno, but it seemed like this little cocktail, one that Carlo had come to appreciate as an adult, was more in place in the urban atmosphere of this great city.

  But wine or Campari, the Italian people would always be who they are, and the Americans would always be who they are. He looked down into the glass and shook it to make the ice cubes rattle around, and he thought of Arabella.

  He missed her, as he missed all of the Filomena family and the people of Altamura, but he knew in that moment that he could not have made her happy in St. Louis. And she could not have made him happy in her village.

  Chapter 62

  Passing on the Burden

  Nino slumped on the edge of his bed, hands folded in his lap, his face showing the weariness of age and the burden he now carried alone. His mother had died many years ago, and now his father, Don Adolfo, was gone too.

  The secret of Altamura was hidden deep underground, in a cellar that everyone had long since forgotten – a secret of such immense importance that it seemed to Nino to have become nearly alive in its own right. He stared down at his wrinkled hands, unmoving, and considered what his next steps should be.

  “Protect the secret always,” Don Adolfo had told him. “Protect not only the relics and the papyrus, but also the knowledge of where they are kept.”

  Nino had eliminated the German art collector, then retrieved the journal from the American, so outsiders could not find the gospel. In his silence among the townspeople, he knew that others had not found out and would probably never know. He considered that to be his mission – keep the cavern safe from intruders.

  But Nino couldn't shake an uncomfortable feeling. He knew that, by doing nothing, the secret would die with him, a prospect that in these later years of life he knew was not too distant.

  Rising slowly, he walked toward a small desk in the corner of his room and sat down heavily into the chair. Taking up a paper and pen, he wrote a brief note, using vague terms and in language that would be understood by only person. Holding the paper up before his eyes to inspect it and, questioning his motives and the correctness of his decision, he laid it down on the desk for a moment.

  Reading his words once more, he signed it, folded it neatly, and inserted it into an envelope that he had taken from the drawer. Licking the gummed edges and applying light pressure to seal the envelope, Nino turned the package over and picked up the pen. On the envelope, he wrote:

  Carlo DeVito

  St. Louis, Missouri

  United States of America

  Then he slipped the sealed envelope into the drawer of the nightstand next to his bed.

  Chapter 63

  One Last Visit

  Arabella sat in her chair staring out into the sunlit piazza beyond her house. She wondered what Carlo was doing, if he had made it safely back to Rome, and whether he had already boarded the airplane for the States.

  Then she stood and walked directly out the door. Thoughts of Carlo and what had transpired in Altamura in recent days made her think more about her family, and about what they had experienced. She had not visited her parents for a few days, since spending time with Carlo, and she wanted to stop by for dinner at their house.

  But before going there, she had a mission to complete.

  She bought a bunch of flowers at the local market and drove a short distance out of town. Before seeing her mother, she wanted to visit her grandmother, and she would appreciate the flowers.

  Turning south down the lane and taking only a few minutes to arrive at her destination, Arabella stopped the car just inside the gates of the cemetery. It was only a little hill up to the site of her grandmother's grave, and Arabella took the climb with ease.

  She stopped at the foot of the grave and lay the flowers on the green grass, then made the sign of the cross. When she had finished her brief prayer, she laid her hand on the gravestone, and traced her fingers across the name etched there.

  “Marisa Valcone,” she said aloud, “beloved wife and mother.” That and the date was all that appeared on the stone, but Arabella knew that her grandmother's life meant so much more to her and to the rest of the family.

  “A man travels the world in search of what he needs,

  then he returns home to find it.”

  George Augustus Moore

  Irish poet

  Afterword

  Altamura and Matera are real towns in southern Italy, just as the Sassi really exist, and just as the Nazi crimes described here were really committed against the Italian people.

  So, too, did the great treasure exist, and Matthias, and his memories – all now lost to the ages.

  Perhaps it is buried somewhere in the southern regions of Italy, where so many of the people of the early Christian church ended up; perhaps it is hidden somewhere in a very private collection in Germany, hidden from public view to protect the stories that the Church wishes to be kept from view.

  And, perhaps, it will one day be found.

  Acknowledgements

  In the course of researching and writing a book, the author is pictured as a lonely laborer, pouring through odd books and dog-eared journals in the dark hours of the night to capture the details of a plot then pecking away at a keyboard to arrange the words in artful fashion.

  There were many nights spent just this way but, in truth, the author labors at the writing desk in the shadow of all those who have supported him and advised him throughout the process of creation. I could not have gotten through this without my wife, Linda, my toughest critic but also my most durable source of insight and inspiration; or without the love and encouragement of my daughter, Kristen, who always makes me feel like a success before I've even begun the task.

  Editing can be a trying and tedious business, but at the hands of my good friend and tireless editor, Dona deSanctis, it became a
motivating influence. Dona didn't miss a mistake, that's true, but her greatest contribution to this work was not catching what I did wrong but reminding me of what I needed to do right. More help with ideas and staging came from Holly Harrington. Good friends and supportive family members, including Laura Lake, Don Rosano, and Mike Hutsell formed a core of early readers, whose thoughts and suggestions probably saved Dona from finding even more errors in her professional review.

  I have long been led by the example of other Italian and Italian-American writers. Principle among them is Paul Paolicelli, an accomplished author himself and a source of endless ideas. And I must thank Robert M. Edsel and Bret Witter, authors of Monuments Men, upon whose book I wrote a chapter in mine.

  Thanks to all for the help, advice, support, and belief in my writing.

  About the Author

  Dick Rosano is a wine, food, and travel writer with long-running columns in The Washington Post, Wine News, Wine Enthusiast and other magazines. He has five recent books on wine. Wine Heritage: The Story of Italian-American Vintners chronicles centuries of Italian immigration to America which laid the groundwork for the American wine revolution of the 20th century. His new series of mysteries is set in varying regions of Italy, featuring picturesque landscapes, intriguing characters, and the wine, food, and culture of the region. They include Tuscan Blood, Hunting Truffles, and The Secret of Altamura: Nazi Crimes, Italian Treasure. More on www.DickRosanoBooks.com. His travels have taken him to the wine regions of Europe, South America, and the United States.

  In addition to his writing career, Dick has spent many years managing a highly trained team in global nuclear counter-terrorism.

  Have you read? More books by Dick Rosano