The Road Beyond Ruin

by Gemma Liviero

  Stefano follows Erich inside.

  “I would feel greedy to take your food. I have had something to eat already.”

  “At Rosalind’s house?”

  Stefano pauses too long. He has heard the concern in the question.

  “Yes.”

  Erich swallows back the lump in his throat and reaches for the whiskey bottle and glasses from the table.

  “Then the rest of this instead—”

  “I am curious if there is something more in your relationship with Rosalind,” Stefano says. The sudden response is a shock and the kind of thing Erich would do during an interrogation: interrupt with an abrupt observation or statement, to catch a prisoner completely off guard.

  “Why do you ask that?”

  Stefano shrugs, but his look is still intense. “I detect something more.”

  “Then you are wrong,” Erich says bluntly. Erich is concerned about the sudden confidence, the brashness, as if there were something deep within Stefano bursting to show itself. But he cannot afford to show concern. It is better for him if there are fewer questions hanging between them.

  “I have no time for Rosalind. The brief visits I have spent with her have only been filled with arguments about her husband. I believe he should be in care, and she says no. Since I spoke my mind, she has been very guarded, very distant in fact. And there is nothing between us.”

  “She seems very lonely.”

  “You should stay away,” says Erich firmly. “I cannot guarantee your safety. I have to tell you some things . . . Georg is a very violent person to other people. If she tells you otherwise, she is lying. He can take an instant dislike to someone.”

  “What has he done?”

  “He has attacked people, so it surprises me that she allowed you and the child into the house.”

  “Has he attacked you?”

  “Not me personally, but I know of others. It is why Rosalind hides away down here. She cannot leave him alone, yet she cannot take him away either. And she doesn’t want my help.”

  Stefano’s dark eyes lock on Erich. There is something in them that looks unhinged, yet at the same time there is emptiness, and longing. He is a contradiction in the way he looks both dangerous and harmless. But it is the grilling, the scrutiny that Erich realizes is happening. Stefano is using the same techniques as he did. The questioning, the waiting, the assessment of lies seem practiced for an Italian soldier who did not want any part in war. It is hard to know whether it is curiosity or probing with some kind of purpose.

  And Erich is just as curious. He has not found company so intriguing. There are things he wants to ask him, that Stefano may have seen and witnessed, perhaps different from himself, yet just as brutal. Erich feels himself weakening. Some of the desire to control things, to be in control, is leaving him.

  They sit at the table, and Stefano reveals some things with the whiskey. He reveals his feelings toward his enemy, his fear of early mornings because he didn’t know what the day would bring.

  Finally, he is what Erich expected, someone talkative, and someone with feelings, but strangely enough these characteristics that make one vulnerable are not disappointing to Erich. Not anymore.

  “Rosalind appears to have control of him,” says Stefano, bringing the conversation back to Georg. “He seems to do whatever she wants.”

  “Don’t rely on that. She gives him something to sleep on the days she goes to the markets. But you must know that he is an addict.”

  1940–1941

  Erich had been withdrawn from university and stood in front of his father, who inspected the party uniform with which his son had just been fitted. It was not an engineering degree that was needed but able, young, and loyal men, his father had been instructed to tell him. Erich was disappointed that he could not follow his father into the private drawing rooms of the führer, and into secret talks about weaponry.

  His father had helped design a tank that moved and turned easily. It cannoned high-explosive shells at a range far better than its predecessors, and the engine had been upgraded. But it had a major weakness: it could not yet penetrate the heavy armor of British tanks, and after a battle in France, his father was back, consulting with design engineers.

  Erich had hoped that he would eventually be part of this engineering quest, but his first commission was to be part of Hitler’s protection squad in Berlin. Erich was given a task that did not put him in great danger. When Erich had asked if he would be sent out in the field, his father had been slow to respond.

  “It takes more than rifle skills and a sense of duty to be a good soldier, but, regardless, the führer does not wish it so.”

  It would be years before Erich would understand the undervaluing his father had just placed on him, so enamored was he by the fact the führer had assigned the task and proud to swear his oath of allegiance. But it was an unusual posting, considering he’d had no training in this area that had nothing at all to do with engineering. He asked his father if he would be under any further supervision.

  “I do not think anyone needs training in such areas.” He sounded condescending, though Erich had been taught never to question his parents. He was a good and loyal son. He would look after his mother if he had to. “It was my original wish that you work alongside me in the ministry since you have the same mechanical interests and an aptitude for such. I recommended a role for you there, but the idea was rejected. They do not have the time for me to mentor you. And they do not need any more engineers. They have enough contracted for now. I don’t make the orders, unfortunately.”

  Erich was relieved at least that his father had tried. No doubt there would be other positions coming up in the future, and more across Europe once the war was won.

  “You will be briefed by someone when you report tomorrow. You are needed to interview and arrest anyone who preaches against the government, including clerics. And you must help organize the transportation of Jews from the city and find those in hiding. You must hunt down all those troublemakers.”

  Was that sarcasm in his father’s voice? His father always spoke gently, but there was something strained, almost stinging, about the tone.

  “You will be deciding where to send people who no longer belong here. After an arrest, you will interrogate thoroughly to learn of networks, especially if they are deemed to be political enemies or involved in distributing material that promotes dissent. You will need to gauge who is fit for labor and who isn’t. Then later if you prove yourself well in this position, you may see a promotion that involves a foreign posting.”

  Standing in front of his father, Erich wondered at his father’s frown and the sweat that fell down the sides of his face. Horst had a quiet manner and a brilliant mind. Erich wanted so much to be like him. Wanted him to be proud. So why didn’t he look proud on this day?

  Erich began his first instruction and learned on the job. He also learned that he had a talent for weeding out liars, for spotting the holes in the stories that were spun. And as time went on, his role deepened. Interrogations sometimes led to executions. In one particular instance, he arrested and interrogated a group of university students for subversion. They were later hanged.

  And as the role had deepened, his father had noticed the change, had commented on it. Had seen others change in the office where he worked. Had seen superiority and the sense of German entitlement spread like a virus, especially among the young. Horst did not like that his son was in the same group as men that had been recruited from prisons.

  Horst suggested to Erich that he should have some free time also. Spend time with friends from university or a girl. But Erich was not interested. Georg was the only one who was interesting, who made stimulating conversation. But with him now in the field, Erich did not feel the need to make other friends. He did not want the distraction of immersing himself in other people’s lives. And now that he was finding a liking for the job, he felt a sense of duty to those around him, to lead them, to show them what loyalty looked like
. And he was enjoying the praise of his senior officers who suggested, after he’d spent several weeks in the position, that he was destined for something greater. Yet his father’s praise, the praise he wanted most, remained the most elusive, and, as time wore on, his father stopped asking about his work altogether.

  He took the advice and called on a girl he’d met at university. He took her out to dinner, but the effort was too great. The work involved too much conversation, and the lack of political talk was dull. And the girl looked faded and uninteresting against his real purpose: the tasks he was assigned. He knew there was pressure there, from his mother also, to marry, to procreate, to have a German girl with him once he’d been sent to a foreign place. A woman who would carry the burden of domesticity without complaint, who would make sure his uniforms were clean, his meals cooked. He did not, however, need someone to take care of him. Though he had already accepted it was unlikely he would find someone like his mother, someone strong, loyal, and intellectual.

  And then came the suggestion to marry Monique, as a favor to Georg, who wished to protect his childhood friend from herself. She was loose with words and had been corrupted by her Jewish friends and others who were not part of the plan for a master race. Georg had convinced him that she was capable, that she would participate in the role, with no expectations of husbandly comfort or support. The pairing would solve issues for both. Suspicion about her political leanings would fall away from her and her family—good German people—said Georg. The arrangement was temporary, he had suggested. Only until the war was over.

  Erich understood. There were lists that he had seen himself. And they were growing longer. Monique’s name was on one of them.

  “Why don’t you marry her yourself then?” asked Erich.

  “It’s complicated,” he said. “She is too close to Rosa. For the sake of our old friendships, I beg this of you.”

  He understood. He had seen the lovesick look in Rosalind’s eyes.

  “Besides, with your commission soon in Austria, it would be good for Monique to stay away from Berlin indefinitely.”

  Erich agreed, though the favor was for Georg alone.

  “Do you remember how much fun it was, the four of us at the river?” Georg said over a glass of red wine. His eyes gleamed like gemstones, Erich had thought at the time. “I saw you laugh at Monique’s adventures, at her spirit many times.”

  Erich did remember Monique and those times, but mostly because of Georg, who was both courageous and clever at everything he did. But those times were gone, and Georg was due to leave again for war. Erich had accepted that things were different now. That the path he was on was destined.

  Georg’s suggestion made sense, and he was one of the few who could influence Erich. But it would mean that Erich would have to take the risk that Monique had indeed conformed. People would be watching. She had promised Georg, who had vouched for it. And that might have been enough. But oddly, it was his father who had been the reason for his final decision. Horst had met Monique previously, and liked her immediately, though he did not give his reasons, and neither did he know anything of the arrangement Erich and Georg had discussed. Only later did Erich realize that his father and Monique had shared many thoughts on the changing Germany, thoughts that were most certainly against National Socialist values.

  Present-day 1945

  The sky is pink and purple, and Erich wonders if Stefano notices these things. Whether he thinks about the type of person he was before the war. If he has any regrets. Erich has been thinking much of Italy, of traveling with Stefano, of leaving everyone, of finding a new place. He must make decisions quickly now.

  “Is it busy in the town?” asks Stefano.

  “It is slowly recovering, but as long as there are Russian military hovering, pretending they alone are the sole victors of the war, it will never fully recover.”

  Erich avoids the Russians. He knows at some point they will come to the house in the city to check on residents as they do, and he hopes to be gone by then. At the moment it is the farmers they are interested in the most, who provide them with what they need.

  It is interesting that Stefano has made some sort of connection with Rosalind, he thinks, in such a short time. It is not likely that she has revealed anything, though he cannot underestimate Stefano’s intelligence either.

  “I think I will check on Michal and retire early also,” Stefano says. “You have had a long day. You probably need to sleep also before you return to work tonight.”

  Erich is disappointed. He expected to spend some of the evening with Stefano before returning later to the town. He wants to question him about the Germans who escaped through Italy, but it is perhaps too soon anyway. He will leave that conversation until tomorrow night. It is best to do these things in the final hours and leave with little notice.

  CHAPTER 17

  STEFANO

  Stefano watches Erich leave for his work, which he believes is a lie. The German shows no wear for the hours he spends in a factory. Stefano is convinced he is sleeping elsewhere but thinks better than to ask the question. He will accept the lie for the house and bed.

  Stefano checks on Michal, who is curled up asleep. From the window he sees the lights are on next door, and wonders what else Rosalind does with her time. He returns to the mattress, though he isn’t tired and waits impatiently for sleep. Just as he begins to doze, there is a faint commotion of some kind, a protest by the geese, and shortly after he hears a soft knock.

  “They are back,” says Rosalind in the doorway, holding a lantern.

  Stefano doesn’t ask. He already knows that she is talking about the Jew and his granddaughter who asked for food earlier.

  “One of the geese is missing,” she says. “I saw the thieves head west in the direction of the forest along the river. There is a trail there, hidden, that runs parallel with the river. It leads to a hut.”

  “How long ago?”

  “Maybe a minute.”

  “Go back home. I will meet you there.”

  “Here, take this,” she says, passing him the light.

  He enters the wood toward the river. Once he is clear of the trees, there is no sign that anyone has been there. At the edge of the thinning wood are denser trees to his right, and he searches with the lamp until he finds the entrance to the track that Rosalind has described. It could easily be missed with the trees and shrubs forming a guard.

  He holds the lamp high to inspect his surrounds. The ground at the entrance of the pathway has been freshly trampled, and he stops a moment to listen for sounds ahead, but the wood gives nothing away. He continues until the track opens up to a small clearing with the hut that Rosalind described. To the left of the hut is a short jetty extending from the embankment above the river. The hut resembles a miniature of many gabled homes. He peers through one of the small grime-stained windows to see that someone is inside.

  The door protests with a squeak, and he pulls its rusting metal handle toward him. He has to bend over to enter, the ceiling low. Georg sits in one corner, staring at something through the window that overlooks the dark river, and beside him is a used syringe, which Stefano suspects was stolen from Rosalind’s bag.

  The scar on the side of Georg’s head is inflamed where it has been scratched at viciously. He is curled into a corner, like a guilty child fearfully awaiting his punishment, and clutching something that was white once, a padded piece of fabric. On closer examination Stefano sees it is a patchwork cloth smeared with mud. There are stains on the twelve rectangles of pastel shades and textures, and pictures of owls and other animals stitched within the patches, but halfway down the fabric, the patches are blank and unfinished.

  “You must know that I am not here to harm you in any way.”

  Georg shifts his focus warily onto Stefano.

  “Are you all right?” Stefano asks. “Do you want me to take you back to the house?”

  “Monique made it,” he says, and Stefano is startled by the clarity in his
voice, and the lucidity of his gaze.

  “Do you want to bring it with you?”

  “You must go,” says Georg. “Do not come back here.”

  “Why not?”

  He doesn’t answer, and Stefano holds the lamp closer to better see his face.

  “Are you alone here, Georg?”

  Georg shakes his head, and Stefano hears a faint rustling behind the cabin. Georg is aware of things, alert from the drug.

  Stefano opens the door again, which does not allow him to leave silently. Hearing whispers, he steps around the corner toward the back. At the sight of Stefano, the man and the girl rush out from their hiding spot and begin to run farther into the wood where the track is thinner, overgrown, and difficult to navigate in the dark.

  Stefano follows with the lamp, leafy branches flicking back against him, launched from the pair in front. The man appears impeded, hobbling and barely able to make it into a run. The girl in front of him is calling him to move faster, her voice afraid.

  Fearing he is about to be seized, the man turns to face Stefano, holding a knife at arm’s length out in front of him. His other hand holds the goose by its broken neck. The girl walks back to be near her grandfather.

  “No!” she says to him, her hand on his outstretched arm.

  The grandfather, with some reluctance, lowers his knife arm to his side, and the girl is not looking at Stefano but shyly down at her feet.

  These are poor, desperate people, like Michal and his mother, who perhaps have no home to go to, and Stefano suddenly understands that it is not just hunger they are afflicted with but that there is no certain end to their isolation and losses. They are outcasts here, everywhere perhaps.

  “Don’t give up,” says Stefano suddenly in French, and the girl looks up while the grandfather watches him with hostile eyes. “There is a displacement camp another thirty miles west from here where you will be fed. You might find a boat abandoned farther along the river, probably your safest way to travel. Take whatever you want from this country. It’s yours.”