A Winter's Night

by Valerio Massimo Manfredi

  The same stories, like a hundred years before, like a thousand years before them. Stories of a life in which the Brunis found many moments of serenity, if not actual joy and happiness. The girls thought of their futures, hoping that one day they’d meet a young man as intelligent and good-looking as one of their brothers. The brothers thought of the girls in town, or—those with the most daring—girls from the next town over, since venturing out involved the risk, or even the certainty, of a fistfight with the young blood there who didn’t appreciate the competition. But as one day led to the next, Callisto could feel the approaching winds of the storm the umbrella mender had warned him about the morning he left. Who knows what had become of him, Callisto thought. Perhaps he’d been wise enough to go far away, to Cremona or Treviso, or maybe he’d even made his way to Genova, where he could get on one of those steamers that went all the way to America. He was no longer a young man, certainly, but perhaps there was still a way for him to seek his fortune there. Or maybe he’d be back with the first snows.

  Callisto could never have imagined how close he was, curled up on the bottom of a hole inside one of the four hills of Pra’ dei Monti, where maybe he’d be found one day by another seeker of the golden demon.

  Toward the end of the month Callisto went to the mill to make arrangements for grinding the wheat, and saw the first page of Avanti! on display on the notice board of the Working Men’s Society. The headline was printed so big you could see it from a distance: Austria Declares War on Serbia. He got closer and saw an article entitled Italy Can’t Sit Back and Watch. But the lettering was too small and the wording too difficult for him to read it. In front of the notice board stood Bastianino, the tailor, with a pair of glasses at the end of his nose, reading out the words one by one under his breath. Callisto, who had been about to ask, “What does the newspaper say?” stood silently and listened, pretending to be reading the article as well. As Bastianino progressed in his reading, Callisto felt a wave of fear and anguish engulf him.

  At the end, the tailor read the signature of the journalist who had written the article: “Benito Mussolini.”

  “But why does this Mussolini want to go to war?” asked Callisto.

  “It’s not that he wants to go to war, it’s not like he’s the king,” replied the tailor. “He says that Italy should step in to combat Austria, to liberate Trento and Trieste, which are Italian cities.”

  “But Avanti is the socialist newspaper; they’re supposed to be on the side of the tenant farmers and workers. Why would they want to send our boys to war? How will we manage? Who will work in the fields? Who will care for the animals? And how many of them will never come back?” As he was speaking he felt a knot squeezing his throat, thinking that he had seven boys of his own, all good to serve the king.

  Bastianino turned towards him and saw the tears in his eyes. “Don’t fret, Callisto,” he reassured him, “we’ll stay out of this. Italy will stay neutral. It says so right here, see?”

  “What does that mean, neutral?”

  “That we’re not on one side or on the other.”

  “That’s not easy.”

  “No. It won’t be easy,” admitted Bastianino.

  Callisto continued on his way until he reached the mill, set up in a little church that had long been deconsecrated. On the back wall you could still make out a faded crucifix though, and everyone was careful not to pronounce the Lord’s name in vain while inside. Callisto entered and looked at that poor tortured boy hanging there on the cross and had to turn his eyes away.

  “Is it all right,” he asked the miller, “if I bring you the wheat tomorrow evening?”

  “Not before four o’clock,” replied the miller. “I’ve got lots of work to do.”

  Callisto walked out, his head thronging with terrible thoughts.

  The grape harvest went well and everyone participated, the boys and the girls and even family friends and neighbors because in the end everyone got to take home a demijohn of wine and three flasks of must to boil up into a sweet grape syrup. The young men showed up willingly for another reason: when the women and girls crushed the grapes under their feet in the wine press, they had to pull up their skirts to move more freely and thus show off their thighs.

  And then there was the party held on the threshing floor, where everyone danced, with three musicians: an accordion player, a clarinet player and a guitar player. The boys had strung up a rope from one side of the courtyard to the other and hung any number of brightly-colored paper balls with candles inside to create glowing lights. Rosina was so beautiful that all the young men couldn’t keep their eyes off her, but even Maria, who was only fifteen years old, found a suitor: a young laborer from a family that came from San Giacomo, in the province of Bologna. His name was Fonso. He went up to Callisto and asked permission to dance with his daughter. “You can dance with her,” replied the old man, “but behave like a gentleman.”

  Fonso was not a looker. His chin was too square and he was already starting to go a bit bald, but he was a great talker, a rarity among the others his age, and the girls listened to him raptly. You could see that Maria was struck by him, although they’d just had a couple of dances together, and she spent the rest of the evening listening to him tell stories.

  Floti glared at the laborer with a look of distrust. “Who’s that?” he asked Checco.

  “A day laborer that the league sent over.”

  “Do you know him?”

  “I’ve talked to him. Seems like a good bloke. What I do know is that he’s one hell of a worker; gets more done than two or three combined.”

  “But he’s getting all lovesick with our sister.”

  “They’re just talking,” replied Checco. “He’s not going to eat her.”

  “I don’t like it. She’s only fifteen. I’m going to tell him to butt out.”

  “Oh, leave him be. I don’t see why they can’t talk. Don’t worry, nothing will happen. But hey, if they do like each other, what’s wrong with that? The important thing is that he’s honest and a hard worker.”

  Floti didn’t say anything else, but he continued to keep his eye on the laborer the whole evening, until the musicians got up and passed around a hat, in case their listeners could afford a bit of generosity. The fact that a day laborer was dancing and chatting with his sister annoyed him; it was a question of standing, after all. Floti was the one offering work here, and the other was his subordinate; if a laborer didn’t find a job for the day, he didn’t eat. In any case, there were no further encounters between the two young men for a long time; there were no more big jobs that required hiring extra help, and if there had been, Floti would have found a way to avoid calling on Fonso.

  For All Saints and All Souls the weather was cold and clear, and for Saint Martin’s Day as well. The leaves on the grapevines had turned red and yellow and the Lambrusco leaves were violet, a real treat for the eyes. The first snow appeared on the peak of Mount Cimone. Clerice told everyone to thank God that they had a roof over their heads, enough food and good wine, and to pray for those poor souls who had been turned out by their landlords and were now wandering about in search of someone who would take them in to work a plot of land.

  “Pray to God that He wards off this war,” said Callisto. “The tailor, who reads the newspaper every day, tells me it’s a slaughter, everywhere, and that we could be next.”

  Floti tried to reassure him: “What does the tailor know, papà? And those newspaper writers, they can say whatever they want; they’re just people like us, you know. I think that seeing what’s happening all over Europe, our government will do everything they can to stay out of the war.” Clerice watched and listened without saying a word, but her eyes brimmed with tears and in her heart she invoked the Madonna, who knew what it meant to lose a son, asking her to keep them safe from this scourge.

  Callisto worried and worried and as winter approached he
hoped the umbrella mender would show up, as he had for many years now. He wanted to ask him more, to have him speak about what he saw in the future, but the days passed and he never came.

  “What could have happened to the umbrella man?” he would say. “He’d always be here by the first snowfall.”

  Gaetano shrugged: “What does it matter, papà, he was just here to eat off of us. I say, if he never comes back, good riddance. If he had at least given a hand! No, he was always out there in the stable sitting and waiting for a bowl of soup. We haven’t lost a thing.” But Callisto was uneasy, and kept fretting over the failed appearance of his guest. When Floti was involved in the discussion, he’d try to change the subject, because what he and Iofa had seen was best kept secret. One day, tired of all that talk, he said that he’d heard that the umbrella mender had sailed to America in search of a better life, and they shouldn’t expect him back any time soon.

  “Ah,” said Callisto, “I thought so,” but it didn’t set his mind at rest.

  In the spring, rumors that Italy would enter the war became more insistent, but they were also contradicted by actual events. The pastor, interpreting the growing anguish of his community, used the homily one Sunday morning to explain just what was going on: the king was willing to go to war to liberate Trento and Trieste which were still under the heel of Austria, but the majority of parliament—and they were the representatives of the people—were contrary to the war. Since the government couldn’t go to war against anyone unless the parliament agreed to it, nothing would happen. It was best nonetheless to raise their voices in prayer to ask the Lord to make the atrocious conflict end and to keep their beloved native land out of it.

  Even Bastianino, the tailor, approved of what the pastor had said, and this reinforced the common opinion that there was no need for fear.

  Until one day the mailman arrived in the Brunis’ courtyard, the leather bag tied to his handlebars bursting with postcards marked with the shield of Savoia. He left one addressed to Gaetano Bruni.

  It was a registered letter. Floti signed on behalf of the true addressee, who was in the stable, but he sent someone to call him. Gaetano was shocked because he’d never received a letter in all his life and it frightened him greatly.

  “What is it?” he asked.

  “Read it,” said Floti, “it’s addressed to you.”

  “It’s written too difficult,” said Gaetano, running a trembling finger down the typewritten lines. “You read it.”

  Floti, who’d already realized what it was, looked into his eyes and said: “It’s the king calling you to arms. You have to leave for the war, Tanein. In four days.”

  “Are you sure?” asked Gaetano. “Is that really what it says?”

  “I’m sure,” replied Floti.

  “Can’t I say I’m sick?”

  “They’ll send out a doctor, who’ll write that you’re fine and then you’ve got to go. And if you don’t go, they’ll say you failed to report for military service and the carabinieri will come and arrest you. If you’re lucky they’ll send you to the front; they say there’s a special battalion destined for desperate actions. You’d be a goner in no time. If you’re unlucky, they’ll put you in front of a firing squad.”

  Gaetano lowered his head, tears brimming in his eyes. Clerice, who happened to be passing by, saw the scene and understood instantly what was happening. She whispered: “Oh Lord, oh most holy Virgin, no . . . ”

  In a matter of minutes the whole family was standing in a circle on the threshing floor around the two brothers.

  “What’s there to gape at?” said Floti. “It’s the postcard: it’s Gaetano’s turn to leave, but more will be coming soon. It depends on how many die at the front and need to be replaced.”

  Callisto looked at his boys one by one, shaking his head with a confused and incredulous expression. The storm clouds foretold by the umbrella mender were gathering over the Bruni home, blacking out the sun and unloosing a boundless disaster. There was nothing he could do to avert the catastrophe. All of the sufferings borne over a lifetime were nothing compared to what was happening before his eyes in that instant.

  When the day of Gaetano’s departure dawned, Iofa came to get his friend with his horse and cart: he wanted to be the one to take him to the train station, just as he’d taken him a year before to visit the notary in Bologna, the day they brought home all that wheat for the family. Gaetano wore a pair of fustian trousers, a white hemp shirt with a detachable collar, a cotton jacket and a pair of cowhide shoes stitched up for him by the travelling shoemaker. His brothers hugged him first: Floti, Checco, Armando, Dante, Fredo and Savino. Then his sisters, Rosina and Maria, who burst out weeping. Callisto, whose chin was trembling like a child’s about to cry, was biting down hard on his lip, and Clerice dabbed at her eyes with the corner of her apron.

  “Don’t cry, mamma, it’s bad luck,” said Gaetano, embracing her. “You’ll see, I’ll be back.”

  Callisto patted his son’s shoulder. “Watch out for snipers, my boy,” he said, “and never smoke at night because they can see the glow of your cigarette.”

  “Don’t worry, papà, I’ll make sure they don’t get me.”

  “Write when you can,” Floti told him, but he immediately bit his tongue. Gaetano hadn’t picked up a pen since third grade. “Find someone who knows how to write for you.”

  Gaetano got onto Iofa’s cart and set off. Everyone stood at the side of the road, waving goodbye with their hands and their handkerchiefs until he disappeared from sight. Then each of them went back to what he’d been doing, still incredulous at what they’d just seen.

  Over the next two weeks, Dante left, then Armando, Checco and Floti, and then it was Fredo’s turn. Savino, who was only sixteen, remained. The same harrowing scene was repeated, in the same way, for each one of them.

  When even Fredo had gone, Clerice knelt alone in the middle of the deserted threshing floor and prayed for her sons.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Gaetano got out of Iofa’s cart at the station of Castel­franco. He took out the government voucher that authorized him to travel free to Modena and from there to Verona where he would have to report to the regiment headquarters.

  “How will I know which train to take in Modena?” he asked.

  “There are timetables that tell you which track to go to.”

  “But I don’t know anything about any timetables,” replied Gaetano, terrified.

  “Then you show this ticket to one of the railway officials and you tell him: ‘I’m a soldier and I have to go to Verona, where’s the track?’ He’ll tell you. The railwaymen have a gray uniform with a hat like the ones the army officers wear. The one with the red hat is the stationmaster. You can’t miss him.”

  “And when I get to Verona? How will I find the regiment?”

  “Oh, don’t worry. They’ll find you.”

  “You know, Iofa, you really know your way around. Where did you learn all these things?”

  “I’ve delivered goods many a time to be loaded onto train wagons. The station is like a seaport: there’s people and merchandise of all kinds, coming and going.”

  They heard a whistle and a locomotive soon pulled up, puffing and wheezing and wrapped in a cloud of smoke and steam. Quite a sight. Like the steam engine they used for threshing but ten times bigger, and pulling train cars behind it instead of the thresher. Iofa unloaded his passenger’s baggage: a sack with some underwear, a few shirts, a piece of parmigiano, a salame and a few loaves of bread.

  “This is your train, Tanein,” Iofa said, using the nickname Gaetano’s brothers had given him as a child. He handed him the sack. “It’s’ time to say goodbye.”

  “How about you, did you get the postcard?” Gaetano asked him.

  “No. Can’t you see I’ve got one leg shorter than the other? I’m not good for the king.”

  “Ain�
��t that the luck? I wish I was you.”

  “Don’t say that. Because no one wants someone like me. I’ve never had a woman. And when I wanted one I had to go pay a whore on the streets of Bologna. It cost me a fortune and I caught the clap off her. I’ll never have a family. I won’t have children, much less grandchildren. You really think I’m the lucky one? Go on, get on that train before it leaves. Take care, Tanein. Try not to get killed.”

  “I’ll try. You take care too, Iofa.”

  And so Gaetano Bruni got onto a train for the first time in his life, to go to war.

  He got to Modena and then to Verona and from there to regiment headquarters, where a sergeant gave him a uniform and confiscated his salame. In a month’s time they had taught him to use a gun and then they put him on another train that went to the front.

  Things went the same way for his brothers but none of them had the fortune of being assigned to the same unit. They soon lost all contact.

  Floti was sent to a regiment of the Fifth Army. Another sergeant lined them up and had them stand at attention and then stand at ease and the commander of the company, Lieutenant Caselli, addressed them: ‘You are here to liberate the last piece of Italy still under the heel of the foreigner and to drive out the Austrians who occupy our territories. If we don’t drive them back they will brazenly advance all the way to your villages, rape your women and seize your homes and your crops. Many of you will fall, but your children, your fiancées and your wives will survive thanks to you and will remember this forever. Viva Italia, long live the king!”