Page 45 of Daughter of Genoa (Escape to Tuscany)

Vittorio

As he packs up his few things, Vittorio briefly wonders what would happen if he didn’t go to the leper ward; if he simply got into bed, hid under the covers and stayed there.

For a moment he stands with a pair of socks in his hand – they aren’t even his socks; they’re the property of the Society of Jesus – and considers it, but the moment doesn’t last. He has to go; he knows that.

Everything he’s done in the last few hours has made it impossible to stay.

He has ruined everything: risked Marta’s life, brought danger upon the entire network, and all because he couldn’t control his worst impulses.

Who would have thought that twenty-five years of Jesuit discipline would end like this?

He shakes his head and goes on packing: spare shirt, underwear, razor and toiletries, breviary, none of them his; all neatly parcelled up and placed in a leather overnight bag that isn’t his, either.

But this will all be squared with his superior, just as his departure will be.

Cardinal Boetto will take care of it. The situation he has created is far too urgent for anyone to hang around seeking permission.

When he gets out of the elevator, don Francesco is waiting for him by the back door. ‘Are you ready?’ he asks. ‘Do you have everything you need?’

‘Yes,’ Vittorio says.

‘You’re sure you wouldn’t prefer to change?’ Don Francesco eyes him worriedly. ‘I can certainly find you some civilian clothes.’

‘No.’ Vittorio has worn a cassock almost every day for the whole of his adult life. Now he’s back in good standing with God and the Church, he can’t imagine taking it off. It would be like disavowing who he is. ‘No, thank you. I appreciate it, but I shall take my chances.’

‘If you really insist,’ don Francesco says, ‘I suppose I can’t stop you.’ And then he does something extraordinary. He puts his arms around Vittorio and draws him into a hug.

It’s a shock, a terribly welcome shock. Vittorio turns hot – he mustn’t cry, he mustn’t – a strangled sound erupts from him and don Francesco rubs his back, just as if he were an upset child.

Vittorio can’t fight any more. He leans his head on the other man’s shoulder and cries: for Marta, for himself, for the unfairness of it all. ‘My poor, dear friend,’ don Francesco says, cradling him in his arms; and Vittorio feels such a rush of affection for him that he cries even more.

When he’s finally hiccuped to a stop, don Francesco gives him a firm pat across the shoulders and releases him. Vittorio quickly turns away and reaches for his handkerchief, mops his face and blows his nose. He’s washed out, foolish, grateful.

Don Francesco smiles at him. ‘Courage, Father Vittorio,’ he says, and opens the door onto the bright, warm street. Vittorio picks up his bag from where he dropped it and steps out into the world.

The hospital is a long way away, about three and a half kilometres, beyond Brignole station.

As sick and slow as he is, it will take him over an hour to walk there.

But the idea of standing on a crowded tram – even assuming they’re running – and rushing to his destination in a series of stops and starts makes him shudder.

This is probably the last morning he’ll be free to walk outside in the sunshine; he ought to make use of it.

He crosses the road and begins to walk up via di Porta Soprana towards the old city gate that stands at the top of the hill.

But the sun is merciless, the heat already rising. After just a few steps, he’s breathing harder; there’s sweat rolling down his forehead, dripping into his eyes. He stops to wipe it away, and when his vision clears he sees them blocking his path. Two SS men, and a woman: an interpreter.

‘ Sie sind Francesco Repetto ,’ says one of the men, the bigger one.

Vittorio doesn’t need an interpreter for that, but the woman speaks anyway in a flat, hostile tone: ‘You are Francesco Repetto.’

Not ‘are you’, but ‘you are’. Not a question but a statement.

He sees himself as they do: a slim dark-haired priest in a black cassock and round glasses, harassed-looking, guilty.

They don’t know the difference between a standard cassock and a Jesuit one.

They don’t know that he’s at least ten years older than don Francesco, and probably looks twenty.

They know only that he fits the description they’ve been given, and that he’s come from the Gesù.

How long have they been watching the back door?

He thinks of don Francesco’s quiet despair in the house chapel a few days ago, his feeling of being hunted.

Ever since Passo del Turchino, I’ve been uneasy .

The German snorts. ‘ Bist du taub ?’ he barks. ‘ Antworte! ’

‘Are you deaf,’ the interpreter repeats in her nasal monotone, stripping away the question mark. ‘Answer me.’

Vittorio knows what he must do. He can make things right, or at least better. He can use his last strength to buy just a little more time: for don Francesco, for Mr X, for DELASEM and all those who depend on it. And then it will all be done, and he won’t have to suffer any more.

‘Yes,’ he says, drawing himself upright as much as he can ‘Yes, I am Francesco Repetto.’

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