A Winter's Night

by Valerio Massimo Manfredi

  The two boys thus had fewer and fewer occasions to see each other. Rossano did make it home during the school holidays, and they would meet up at the sports center, where they kicked around a soccer ball or even played bocce. Both tried to avoid talking about politics so as not to ruin their friendship, but it wasn’t easy. The subject always came up somehow and it would be very embarrassing for both of them, especially since Rossano, after two or three years at school, took to wearing the fascist uniform, with its black shirt and silk-fringed fez.

  “What do you mean by that uniform?” Fabrizio asked him one day. “Can’t you wear something normal, at least when we’re together?”

  “This is normal for me, don’t you understand? It means that I’m a volunteer for the national security militia.”

  “What need is there for a militia? Don’t we already have the police; aren’t the carabinieri good enough at taking care of national security?”

  “We act under the direct orders of the Duce and we are prepared to make the ultimate sacrifice for him and for our country.”

  “I see you’ve been indoctrinated well.”

  “You’re the one who’s been indoctrinated by the reds, the defeatists and the traitors of our country!”

  Fabrizio looked down without reacting: he’d learned there was no changing him and thus no point in arguing. His friend had been raised to believe in an out-and-out cult of a supreme leader to whom he owed blind obedience.

  “Do we have to fight?” asked Fabrizio.

  Rossano held his tongue in the face of a question that took all the fire out of the debate.

  “Well?” insisted Fabrizio.

  “No . . . we don’t have to, but you provoked me.”

  “I was only trying to make you see that since you’ve been going to that school, you’re not the same. You look for an enemy even where none exists, and it seems like you’re always looking for a fistfight. Anyway, you’ve joined up with a group who goes around beating people up, the same ones who burned my father’s stable down because our family didn’t see things their way. You know what I’m talking about. Think about it, Rossano, turn back while you’re still in time. An idea that splits apart two guys who have been friends since birth is certainly a bad one.”

  They lost touch with each other. Rossano continued to attend the party school, moving from Perugia to Rome, and on the few occasions he came back to town, there wasn’t much time. If they ran into each other, after a first brief moment of delight, a certain uneasiness stepped in, reflect­ing their differing conditions and convictions but even more so the sensation of no longer feeling comfortable with one another. They still felt nostalgic about their childhood, when they’d spent long hours playing together or just laying on the grass watching the clouds and the birds flying by, in absorbed, silent contemplation. They would try to change the subject to girls, but even that didn’t work. So in the end they’d just say goodbye.

  “See you around.”

  “See you around.”

  Fabrizio got along well with Bruno Montesi, even though he was quite a bit older. Bruno had opened up a shop in the area of town that people called “Madonna della Provvidenza,” since it was near the sanctuary. So everyone simply called Bruno “the Madonna’s blacksmith.” When some work needed doing on his father-in-law’s farm, Savino would send Fabrizio to summon Bruno because he had a forge and bellows. Sometimes it would be to make the grating for a window, or a fence for the pigsty. Or a door hinge that needed replacing. He was also good at sharpening the scythes and the blades on the hoes and spades before the spring planting season. Fabrizio would sit and watch that spry, slender boy wielding a one-kilo hammer as if it were made of wood. He always had that curious smell of the forge about him.

  “You smell like iron,” Fabrizio would tell him.

  “That’s natural, it’s my job. Your farmhands smell of soil.”

  “And the cowherd smells of manure, I can tell you that,” the boy would laugh.

  “Yeah, right. But did you know that your name, Fabrizio, comes from Latin and that it means blacksmith?”

  “No, I never knew that. So we have something in common.”

  “I’m sure we have more in common than that!”

  They’d always banter like that, when there was time, and you could tell that Bruno read a lot, or studied, or spent time with people who did. He knew about politics, the economy. He spoke Italian easily, although the man who leased him the shop could barely read or write.

  Bruno was twenty years old when radios all over the country broadcast the voice of the supreme leader announcing the reappearance of Empire on the fated hills of Rome. Fabrizio was fifteen but he had an idea of what was going on.

  Savino had a radio, a CGE with a decorated screen and three strips of Bakelite that covered the speaker. A magical iridescent eye let you know when the frequency was being picked up at its clearest. Bruno was also invited to listen, although he was there to work.

  “What do you think, papà?” Fabrizio asked when the speech was finished.

  Savino’s forearms were down on his knees and his head swung between his shoulders.

  “Nothing good. Big words to blow smoke in people’s eyes. Anyone who doesn’t go into raptures is a defeatist.”

  “A war that we can’t afford,” commented Bruno. “I can hardly believe it; the Italians, who know what it means to suffer foreign dominion, are going out to oppress other peoples? It would have been much wiser to invest all that money in Italy, to improve the conditions of the poorest classes.”

  But in town, and in all the surrounding towns, celebrations and parades were the order of the day. Rossano participated, marching in uniform among the Avanguardisti, the youth wing of the party. Fabrizio met up with his friend that very evening at the soccer field, where a game between two of the nearby towns was scheduled. Rossano, who was much taller and more muscular than most boys his age, bulging in his black uniform, looked like one of the young heroes depicted on the cover of the weekly Domenica del Corriere supplement. Fabrizio couldn’t help but feel a pinch of admiration for his enthusiasm and glamour.

  “The English and French have attacked us because we’ve conquered Ethiopia. Hah! They, who have the biggest colonial empires of the world, which certainly weren’t conquered without destruction and slaughter.”

  “So why should we make the same mistakes? Wouldn’t it be better to imitate the good aspects of those countries, like democracy, respect for the law, economic and civic progress, organization of trade unions?”

  “They’re nothing but hypocrites. Even the Americans have said so. Who told you such a crock of shit, anyway? You’re repeating words that someone else put in your mouth.”

  Fabrizio wanted to say: “Bruno.” That was the truth, but he realized it was better not to reveal his source. He said: “I know how to reason on my own. I only wonder if you do.”

  Rossano put a hand on his shoulder. “I don’t feel like quarrelling with you, today, buddy,” he replied, obviously in a good mood. “I’m too happy. We’ll no longer be a country of emigrants, a people mocked and humiliated. The whole world will have to respect us! Now we have an empire of five million square kilometers, rich with raw materials, in a strategic position for trading with the Orient. We’ll build streets, airports, universities . . . there will be work for everyone!”

  Fabrizio changed the subject: “Did you know that our fathers were always friends?”

  “Of course, they still are. But now the socialists have to get it into their heads that the country must unite; we must become one people with a single leader.”

  Fabrizio cut their conversation short to avoid another argument. “So long, then.”

  “See you around, buddy,” replied Rossano. They would not see each other again for years.

  A few months later, when the League of Nations imposed economic sanctions on Italy for t
he invasion of Ethiopia, Mussolini proclaimed that the country would become an autarky. In this push for economic self-sufficiency, the idea was put forth that all the women in the country should donate the gold rings they’d received from their husbands on their wedding day. This collecting of the wedding bands was done in public, so that no one would dare to refuse. In reality, not all the married women in town even had gold rings to offer up, but those who did deposited them in a copper pot, which in the end was half full. Each of these women was given a steel band in exchange, free of charge.

  There was a widow in town who no longer had her wedding ring because after her husband had died, she had pawned it to make ends meet, and she had never managed to redeem it. She showed up one day at the end of June, her ten-year-old son in tow, at the estate where Fonso worked, asking if she could glean the spikes that had been left behind after the harvest.

  Fonso exchanged words with the steward, who happened to be passing by, then came back to tell her: “Go and gather up everything you can find, Carolina. I hope it’s a lot.”

  With the sun already high in the sky, the woman began to go up and down the rows of stubble, an empty sack in her hand, helped by the little boy. As the hours passed, the sack filled up. She was careful to keep the contents pressed down, so that more spikes would fit, and at the end of the day, she had two big sackfuls, packed well. There was enough there to make bread for six or seven months, and both mother and son were happy. Just as she was about to load the sacks onto a wheelbarrow with Fonso’s help, a truck pulled into the courtyard. At the wheel was a fellow with the pompous name of Astorre who, out of work and without a penny to his name, had begun working for the commander of the local fascist militia. He made himself useful by running errands, delivering packages and carrying messages. He always wore his uniform because he had nothing else to wear anyway, and besides, he felt important and respected in that outfit. People had begun to fear him, not because of his uniform, but because they knew he was willing to spy on the villagers and report back with false and slanderous information. The very fact that they thought of him as dangerous gave him more power. But among themselves, when no one was listening, they called him buférla, the name of a bird who was reputed to live on cow dung.

  Having seen Carolina pushing the sacks of wheat ears onto the cart, Astorre walked up with his arms akimbo. “Well, who do I see here. If it isn’t Miss Carolina!” The little boy, frightened, went to hide behind his mother’s skirt. “I’ve been told that you didn’t give your gold ring to your country.”

  “I don’t have any gold. I had to pawn the ring that my late husband gave me and I’ve never managed to get it back. I swear it’s true, Mister Buférla.” In her embarrassment and confusion, she had let the name slip out.

  Enraged at this insult, his face as red as a pepper, he burst out: “I won’t hear any excuses! If you didn’t give up your gold, you know what we’ll do? I’ll take half of the wheat you’ve gathered and we’ll consider your debt settled.”

  Fonso, who’d witnessed the scene, broke in: “You can’t be serious, Astorre. She’s a poor widow who can barely eke out a living for herself. We left those spikes behind just for her. She’s not here asking for charity; she worked all day under the hot sun with her boy helping. There are no spikes left, and for them it means bread for the rest of the year.”

  “That doesn’t concern me. On the contrary, I know you’ll give me a hand to load this sack on the truck, Fonso, if you don’t want me telling the appropriate authorities that there was a red flag flying on your thresher the other day.”

  Fonso bit his lip but answered back: “Do what you will do, Astorre, but I refuse to be a party to this travesty.”

  Buférla knew well that Fonso was too hard a nut for his teeth to crack, and he took care of loading the sack of wheat onto his truck himself. Fonso whispered in the meantime to the widow: “Don’t worry, Carolina, I’ll find a way to make sure you’re not lacking wheat to make your bread.”

  But, before he could finish, the little boy threw himself at the villain, punching, kicking and biting. He shouted out: “The sack is ours! Leave it alone, it’s ours!”

  Bufèrla, infuriated, gave him a hard kick and sent him rolling into the dust. His mother ran over to help him, but he was already back up on his own, bouncing like a spring. He took a step towards his enemy and said: “When I’m bigger, I’m going to kill you.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  When Savino’s father-in-law began complaining of a heart ailment, Savino was put in charge of the administration of his properties. He started out by making a number of improvements in the farm setup and in the irrigation system, and bought a couple of new vehicles, including a fifty-horsepower single-cylinder Landini tractor with a hot bulb engine and a deep-trench plow. Fabrizio went crazy when he saw them drive the tractor up, shiny and brand new, straight from the factory. When the dealer showed them how to start it up, the heavy flywheel began turning swiftly, overcoming the resistance of the big single cylinder. The only thing he wasn’t crazy about was its dull gray color, he would have preferred red or orange.

  All the day laborers had gathered around it, along with the two farmhands and the cowherd, to take part in this extraordinary event. In their eyes, the roaring machine was a wonder of technology, capable, they thought, of any endeavor.

  “You think it could pull down that oak?” asked one of the men, pointing to a century-old tree.

  “I say no,” replied another.

  “I say it would,” shot back the first. “Why don’t we try?”

  Savino was obviously against it, but had he consented there was no doubt that the tractor would have been powerful enough. The men would have willingly uprooted a century-old oak tree just for the pleasure of seeing a technological force win out over a natural one. Some launched into an academic discussion as to how many pairs of oxen it would take to provide equal power, and others wondered whether it really had the strength of fifty horses, something that was a bit difficult to believe. The next day, anyway, Savino was going to plow a couple of furlongs of stubble and they’d see just what that steel horse was capable of.

  Unfortunately, he wasn’t able to do it himself because his father-in-law had another attack and he had to go fetch the doctor with the carriage.

  When Munari reached the patient’s bedside, he used his stethoscope to listen to the man’s chest in several places. When he was finished he prescribed an aspirin a day and a shot of brandy when he needed it, and then walked outside with Savino.

  “He won’t last long,” the doctor told him. “A year, two if he’s very lucky. He has severe heart failure and there’s no cure for it.”

  “Pardon my asking, doctor, but if he’s so badly off, how will one aspirin and a half-glass of brandy help him?”

  “Ahh, ignorance!” sighed the doctor. “Do you know why your father-in-law is so unwell? Because he’s eaten too much his whole life. The time comes when the heart can’t pump blood to all the parts of that huge body of his. So water begins to accumulate in the lungs and . . . ” he made the sign of the cross with his middle and index fingers united, “amen. The aspirin will keep his blood fluid and the alcohol in the brandy will dilate his arteries so the heart doesn’t have to work so hard. That’s why it’s called a ‘cordial,’ from the Latin word for good for your heart.”

  “I see.”

  “Good. And so he might last two years instead of one, but no more than that, I’m afraid.”

  Savino and his wife Linda followed all the doctor’s instructions to the letter and his father-in-law lived exactly two more years; this inspired them with a faith that might have been more rightly placed in a prophet than in a town doctor.

  But it wasn’t the same everywhere in town. Many said that the doctor only went to examine the rich, those who could afford to pay him, and not the poor. It wasn’t true, because he even treated the children of gypsies, who ce
rtainly had no money, but people believe what they want to believe and sometimes even deny what is evident.

  Fonso often brought his little daughter Eliana to the doctor’s house; they treated her as their own and she adored being pampered by the doctor’s signora, as everyone called her. At home, besides her mother who was always scolding her, there were her nonna, her father’s mother, and her spinster aunt as well, and all of them were always ordering her around. Do this and do that and learn to sew and learn to roll out the pasta. Sometimes, the signora would even give her a banana to eat, an exotic fruit with an intense fragrance that was totally absent from the tables of ordinary folk.

  “Eat it here,” the signora told her. “If you go out, the other little girls will see you and they’ll feel badly because they can’t have one.”

  Every now and then she took a photograph of little Eliana and this was a real luxury. The signora would comb her hair and put a big bow in it and have her sit on the banister on the outside staircase or on the swing, and the doctor would take her picture.

  Eliana knew how privileged she was and she knew what a good heart the doctor’s wife had; every year, for the Epiphany, she would play la befana and give little gifts to all the poor children: an orange, a tangerine, some peanuts and, for the girls, rag dolls that she bought in the city.

  The doctor had the impression once that Eliana’s shoulders were becoming stooped and he asked to see Maria. “I don’t like the look of this,” he told her, “the girl’s back isn’t straight; it must be corrected immediately. You must do exactly as I say if you don’t want her to turn into a hunchback.”

  Maria widened her eyes in terror.

  “If you listen to me, everything will be fine. Now pay close attention: every morning, as soon as she wakes up, strip her down and wrap her in a sheet soaked in cold water. She’ll cry and scream, she’ll ask you to stop torturing her, but you pay her no mind. Just keep doing it for as long as I tell you it’s necessary. She should also skip rope for at least half an hour a day and drink at least two glasses of milk, every day. Plus a spoonful of cod-liver oil.”