Memories Of Our Days

1 Chapter X

Ada

The next few days the women were going back and forth to nurse the patient.

Ada’s condition was getting worse. The very high fever did not give her a break and in a short while her prosperous body had become so thin that it was hard to recognise it. Lucia had been called in to help with the family chores. She looked after the little ones taking them outside even if the days were now quite cold. Antonino and Clara were aware of what was going on and were just carrying on quietly, the twins were quick to shake off the sadness that they could feel within the house walls. Once they were out, they would play happily without any worry. Lucia used to bring Andrea along when she got some work at the Barrieri’s because she did not have anyone to leave him with so they three of them would play happily together. In the evening, all the time spent playing in the open air would make them more tired than usual and they were sent to bed very early.

During the night the women would take turns to look after the sick woman. They tried to alleviate her suffering placing some damp cloths on her forehead. The temperature was so high and in the last few days her rasping breathing seemed to fill the whole house.

Ada’s death left a great void as usually unexpected death do and everything felt really unbelievable. What happened, unexpected and tragic at the same time, got the adults to live with the thought of how life was precarious. This feeling along with the tiredness and bewilderment, would make them feel out of energy. Giovanni was walking around the house and could not decide when to get back to work, Maria seemed to have aged, within those few days, quiet and skinny in her black dress.

Giulia was in control of the situation and was hiding behind a painful and efficient silence. When she realised that there was nothing they could do, she had immediately changed her attitude. Without wasting time in commiserations, she organised the family life to try and cope better in those stormy days. She would talk very little and she would be there day and night for the sick woman tirelessly. Maria and the rest would follow her instructions, like sailors who, in dangerous situations, see their captain as the only person to put their full trust in and not someone who just give orders.

The children reacted differently to the news about the death. Antonino cried for quite a while and lost in his suffering, he had sought shelter in his mummy and aunt’s arms. He had never got into her room and he did not want to see when she was dead. Clara had kept aside. She did not ask for updates. She would look around quietly, then she would spend whole afternoons locked up in her room, forgotten by everybody and just get out when her brother would come in to her looking for company and consolation and they would go downstairs together to eat. When her father asked her if she wanted to say her last goodbye to her auntie, she said yes. They held hands and she went over to the bed where Ada’s lifeless body was resting, dressed as she had seen her on special occasions, with the black shawl over her head that she wore in the church and the rosary beads in between her fingers. She looked at her for long and thought that she seemed to be made of wax, her thin nose and her plump body, always willing to give a warm hug, now still and cold. She felt the distance and Giovanni felt her little hand in his shaken by a nervous tremor. He put his arm around her shoulders and held her in the attempt to shelter her from that sorrow that for the first time, without any tears, was shaking her soul. She got her to leave the room holding her tight to her leg and she could not the warm smell that was comforting her greatly.

1 Chapter XI

Worries

There were not many people at the funeral. People were afraid to get infected and many people did not get back from the war. In the church there were especially the women who sat in the front seats, they were dressed in black with big dark head scarves which were covering their hair. Few men were standing at the bottom of the church, with their hats in their hands. Rudi arrived before the coffin was taken out of the house. He got the news when he was still at Fosco’s where he had stopped a few days after the end of the war. He left right away and his friend did not want to leave him alone and went with him to Viterbo.

Giulia met him at the door.

-Rudi..you got back in time…-

Giulia…-

They held each other tight, in silence, and for a moment she thought that he was not the young man who left a few years before.

-I brought Fosco with me… I was in his house…the headquarters told me the news while I was there…I had given them his address…-

-Very good… we did not know how to contact you and…-

-Giovanni…-Rudi went over to his brother-in-law who was coming down the stairs of the bedrooms and their handshake was so meaningful that no words needed to be spoken.

-Are the children and Maria well?-

-Yes, they are fine – Giulia replied- They have already gone to the church. We did not want them to see ….-

- Good idea, much better this way…Sorry Giovanni, I have not introduced Fosco Frizmajer to you yet….

Slightly aside Fosco was watching the scene as a viewer waiting to be a part of. All wrapped up in his long black coat looked taller and thinner. The handshake with his bony hand while they were being introduced seemed strong and sincere to Giovanni. Giulia sensed his enquiring look when he bend down to greet her.

In the church the nieces and nephews would have wanted to go to Rudi and Antonino smiled and a sudden joy went through his eyes. His auntie’s look was quite enough to discourage him to do anything.

In the evening they all sat around the table. The children went straight to bed because they were exhausted with all the grief and the toil of a long day. The three men sat down to talk while Giulia and Maria tidied up the kitchen.

Fosco had been quiet during most of the dinner, almost sorry to have slipped in that private situation of family grieving. However, Rudi and Giovanni managed to involve him in their conversation and just then Giulia had stopped to analyse him. During the meal she felt a bit embarrassed every time she felt he was staring at each of them, unintentional violation of the family intimacy. She did not sense a superficial curiosity of a stranger but the desire to get down into each of them, almost as if he wanted to get a confirmation of a previous belief.

Maria had an ashen complexion and her black dress highlighted the paleness of her face. She shut herself away, isolated from the others, searching her sister-in-law with her eyes to get instructions as what needed to be done. Nothing that was being said forced its way through her pain.

-We’ll go upstairs, if you don’t mind- Giulia spoke for the two of them. Fosco stood up to greet them and everybody wished good night, after days of hard work.

As soon as the men were left alone in the big kitchen now quiet, the tone of their conversation changed, as if up to that moment they wanted to shelter the women from all their worries.

After a moment of silence, Giovanni said almost under his breath

-What do people say in Milan about this armistice?-

-Well… at the moment people are just enthusiastic about the end of the war- Rudi replied.

-Yes, that’s right. At Villa Giusti a long nightmare has ended-

-We should get ready for big changes – Fosco said.

-What do you mean? What changes? Haven’t we experienced enough of them? - Giovanni turned to the young man who suddenly looked more alert and austere.

-We won’t be the same any longer. I am not talking about us who experienced the war in the barricades, but about the whole society-

-I was actually thinking we were liberating Trento and Trieste… - Rudi spoke softly

-Many other young men thought the same as you- Giovanni replied, almost as if he was trying to comfort him.

-Nobody, whether they wanted the war or not, would have ever thought that it was going to be so huge. That has never been one in history. Millions of dead people….millions…you know, millions of dead people and disabled people- Fosco seemed to be talking to himself- The United States which entered a European war with all their economic power…such different worlds that come close. I wonder what consequences there will be…-

-And what about what happened in Russia? What a great revolution we experienced!- Rudi added

-The truth is that not just three years went by, but a century…-

-This big upheaval will change the way people saw the world, it will change our lives ..maybe you are not so aware here in the village…for you life has stayed the same and the war has only brought sorrows, without changing things too much. In the cities however it was very different. Many women did men’s jobs and we can’t go back. This and much more will get our values and habits to change…-

Giovanni listened quietly. The two young men seemed to understand that that was only the beginning of a new world, new and full of unfamiliar situations. He felt almost old. Not so much old but he felt he was holding on to a time that was not going to be the same and would have easily got out of his hands. He saw his children in an unknown future and, like every father, he was afraid he could not protect them as he would have wanted.

Rudi and Fosco left again after a few days. Rudi had now decided to move to Milano. Fosco would help him get a job for his newspaper.

1 Chapter XII

1919

Fosco’s flat was small and always untidy. Plates and glasses would easily fill up suddenly the kitchen, which you could access climbing two steps. The desk was packed with pieces of papers, it was huge as compared to the rest of the furniture, it had been moved under the window of the sitting room and now the bed for the new guest had taken its place. Fosco insisted on giving him the only bedroom because he did not sleep that much

-You see, with all the mess that’s around here, you are running the risk that during the night, in the darkness, I can fall on top of you. You are safer there. -

Rudi did not accept.

As a matter of fact, Fosco did sleep very little. During the hottest evenings he would look outside the window for hours smoking, watching the night life in Milan where now and again a drunkard would fall down to the ground quietly by a lamp post and tried hard to get back up mumbling meaningless sentences. Women with flashy clothes showing a low-cut neckline would pass by laughing far too merrily, wrapped around men of any age who would stop to hug them with lust and kiss them on the neck. To Fosco was enough a gesture, a word pronounced in the quietness of the night to be able to imagine the lives of unknown passers-by, follow their thoughts and their habits to the squalor of their houses or to the respectable routine of a bourgeois life.

The whispers of the city at night, mixed with the dampness, would get into the room and would fill it with a strange sadness which blended with the smoke of the cigarettes. That went on until the malaise that took over him was almost unbearable. He then closed the window to keep it outside.

Only at daybreak the city started to change. The doors of the house opened and closed quietly. Men and women would go out lazily to go to work, doing one another’s chores which could not even thought of before the war. People who knew one another greeted with a nod of their heads, the others would pass by without looking at one another, still thinking about their bed and their sleep. Often that was the time when Fosco would go to bed, and then wake up a short time after, rested as if he had slept all night. Sometimes dawn would come all of a sudden, as by surprise, and he was busy writing.

Rudi got to know him and did have the intention to get him to change his habits. That’s why they decided to bring another table in the bedroom so that it could be Fosco’s new desk, where to spend his long sleepless nights.

Fosco did not have to insist too much to get his friend employed by the same newspaper. It was necessary to have young people willing to follow the fast events which were troubling the city. Rudi introduced himself as a young man suitable to follow the city news section. He was out and about with the new job. In the evening, when he got home they commented together on the daily events, more and more concerned about the feeling of distress which could be felt in the city

-Today I saw a group of women who were demonstrating outside a bakery. They were screaming that the bread can’t be four times more expensive than a few months ago. The baker got scared and locked up the shop-.

-Since the end of the war, life has become more difficult. After the peace, life has not gone back to normal as we hoped. Too much discontent, too many promised that have not been kept. I fear that this situation will lead to the worse-

-No matter where you go, there are groups of people who talk about wages going down, the cost of living has gone up enormously, new taxes on the way and those who are back from the front after a long time do not have a job anymore-

-We must expect many and new social changes, Rudi, many and new-

-Yesterday I went past the headquarters of that new movement.

-Which one?-

-The Italian fascist movement-

-Have you seen anything unusual?-

-No, but I had the impression that contrapositions between different movements will not fail to show up soon-

-If acceptable solutions for everyone are not found soon, if this discontentment is underestimated, I am afraid that there will be serious consequences to face-

In Milan, industry and agricultural workers along with retailers would get together more and more often to express their difficulties that the government seemed to ignore. Virtually every day there were riots which were more or less violent among groups of nationalist and socialist rioters. There were numerous parades and political meetings which easily ended up violently and the population, from the richest to the poorest, lived in a state of great distress, in the cities as well as all over Italy.

Fosco and Rudi got up early. The mid -April light was just about peeping through the windows. It was going to be a long and busy day. That morning a general strike was scheduled by the Socialist Party after the riots with the police occurred two days before. A worker died and a few others had got injured.

Fosco was standing beside the cooker making a very strong coffee, the first one of a long series.

-I am concerned- Rudi said – All it takes is for the wrong bunch of people to join the parade for everything to degenerate.-

-With what is going on daily in the city, it is really very worrying- Fosco replied tightening too much the coffee maker. He managed to find a bagful of real coffee, instead of that stuff that people had been using for years now. The morning preparation was very accurate, virtually meticulous. To They kept silent, deep in their thoughts, listening to the sound of the water that was starting to boil. Fosco accurately turned the coffee maker around. Rudi smiled at his great commitment. A lovely smell of coffee all over the kitchen.

-Do you think that the nationalists will give up their demonstration against the official one?

-I don’t think so- Fosco replied – the parade was cancelled but I fear that not everybody is in agreement. I bel someone will demonstrate anyway. It won’t be easy to keep under control the most riotous ones among the socialists-

More silence in the room. Staring at the empty cups, the two friends sat still deep in their thoughts.

Fosco was the first one to break his inner monologue

-Where is the newsroom sending you today?- he asked

-I’ll be in the city centre keeping an eye on people’s state of mind …what about you?-

-I’m going to the Arena to a political meeting-

-Shall we meet up at the newsroom headquarters tonight?-

-We’ll stay up till late tonight…-

-Yes, we’ll stay up till late tonight- Rudi replied.

1 Chapter XIII

At the newsroom

What Fosco and Rudi feared was true.

Despite the speakers pleading to end the political meeting peacefully, an extremist fringe had headed off to the city centre.

Rudi was at Piazza del Duomo when the first nationalists arrived. They were mainly young students and army cadets who were getting agitated trying to understand what they could do. The police was keeping an eye on them trying to avoid aggressive actions. The group went ahead. Rudi followed it all along the way. At Piazza Cavour other protesters joined in. The most rowdy people were shouting –To the Duomo , to the Duomo- and all the people were restless not knowing exactly what was going on.

One of his colleagues got scared by what was happening and warned him that a group of socialist protesters was about to get there too.

-They are coming, they are coming- he shouted all excited.

-Who?-

-The other ones, the other ones…-

-Where?-

-Over there, over there, from Via Mercanti…-

It was happening what Rudi feared. The police themselves, despite all their efforts, did not manage to break up the protesters. The clash was inevitable .

Truncheons, rocks and gunshots left several wounded and a dead person on the ground. Rudi was trying to keep at a distance without missing out the events.

At the end of the toughest clashes, the nationalists won but people were not satisfied and the bustling crowd headed off this time to the newsroom headquarters Rudi and Fosco worked for.

What happened inside and outside the newsroom headquarters was just horrible. Journalists found it difficult themselves to report what happened.

Only the day after the two young men realised the dreadful mess that they had made: they used the clubs and flammable liquids to destroy everything.

Back at home Giovanni read the news on the newspaper. Before breaking it to the family, he tried to get in touch with Rudi. That was the only way to reassure Giulia completely.

Rudi himself contacted him on a public phone. After reassuring him that he was fine, they agreed that he would have written a letter explaining all the events he had witnessed.

The series of news that referred daily to these kinds of events started to worry Giovanni.

In the village too there were some small groups of people with a different views that were expressing their dissatisfaction but the disagreements never went beyond the mere oral level. After Ada’s death, the family life got its routine made of daily events related to work and some little worries. Violent riots like what happened in Milan did not predict anything good. The worries about the future for everyone added onto the distress of everyday life.

Rudi’s letter arrived. He wrote about the newsroom headquarters could carry on its work among many difficulties, about how worried he was about the events happening in the city where the Arditi* formation of the shock troops, led by Benito Mussolini, was becoming more and more popular..

*Note: Arditi was the name adopted by the Royal Italian Army elite special force of WW1

1 Chapter XIV

1925

Giulia up before dawn and was busy around the kitchen trying to be as quiet as possible. Everybody was still asleep. It was Sunday and there was no school for the children. They could stay in bed for a couple of hours.

School.

She was smiling thinking about how Antonino put up with it. In a few months’ time he was going to sit his final diploma exam and his torture would be over. The high school years had been really hard for him, he carried out his duty only because he knew he had to and he did not dare to rebel against it but he would grab any chance he had to get away from it. She saw him coming down from his room with an angry face every time he had spent time just to do his homework and come back cheerful and full of energy from a day at the land, doing the heady jobs of the adults. She would have liked to lift him from that commitment forced on him by the family. Every time he would go up the stairs, with a long face, with his books and copy books to lock himself into his room to study, she would find any excuse to go in and talk to him or bring him a piece of cake.

Clara seemed to be bothered by her rare intrusions. School had always been a pastime for her. She learnt quickly and she was able to carry out any task quickly and at the best of her abilities. Giulia went up with an excuse just to check on her, to see how she spent her time.

Every time she went into her room, she was reading the books that she borrowed from the school library and she would ask the same question every time:

-Clara, would you like anything?- and the same answer followed

-No, thank you, I’ll be down in a minute.-

Their relationship had not improved. Giulia saw her grow up with the pride of a mother for her daughter who was more beautiful every day and with the worry that there was this invisible obstacle which did not let her and nobody else get in to get to the bottom of her thoughts. The relationship with her father was her favourite like when she was small but Giovanni’s look had changed too. She was sixteen now and Clara was too big now for the complicity they had when she was a child. He wanted to protect her still, he would look at her when she was not looking and was overwhelmed by fear and jealousy for her. Antonino now would make her often laugh with his spontaneity. He had kept with her, and with everybody else, a cheerful and straightforward he relationship. Given the fact that he was older and stronger, when he was close to her, he would tease her with little punches and gentle pushes which would make her sway, and then he would whisper in her ear:

-Can you write the composition for me for tomorrow?-

-No, do it yourself!-

Being taller, he would hold her tight by her waist from behind and would lift her off the ground, begging her:

-Please, please, I beg you… -to the point that he would make her laugh, forcing her to give in to him.

Clara was very patient with the twins. Agnese and Luciano had kept their exclusive relationship growing up which would make them into a specific unit, but now Agnese, who was a teenager now, was often looking for her sister’s company. She was happy when she could spare some of her time for her.

-Good morning Giulia-

Maria’s voice, even though it was quite soft, gave her a start.

-Good morning. Already up?...You should have rested a little longer

.Is everybody asleep?

-It’s Sunday today, there’s no school-

-That’s right, right…it’s Sunday today…we have to make fresh pasta then…-

-Yes, we’ll do it in a minute. Don’t worry, there is still plenty of time.-

Maria was not the same anymore after Ada’s death. Her lean body had slightly bent over as if the weight caused by that sorrow was too big for her shoulders. The expression of her face had changed most of all. She seemed to have lost those little convictions which had always kept her going and now she depended totally on Giulia for everything. She waited trustfully for Giulia’s instructions, looking at her like a child looks at his teacher before starting a test, in order to start diligently to carry out the task she had been given, quietly. She answered the questions that she was asked, and would never express her own opinion or jump into the conversation of her own accord. Only Antonino with his little jokes and Agnese who would kiss her on the cheek from time to time and would call her auntie, were able to make her smile. Despite being much younger that her, Giulia considered her now like a daughter in need of continuous guidelines. It was just dawn when at the bottom of the driveway showed up a person wrapped up in a dark shawl. She was walking fast, almost running, holding the shawl around her waist with her crossed arms. Giulia stopped to look at her with apprehension because she was not expecting anyone at that time of the morning and feared some bad news on the way. She got nearer and she saw that it was Lucia.

Since Ada died, Lucia was working there every morning. Giulia and Maria needed some help and Lucia had virtually grown up in their house, working in the fields or helping with little jobs. She was so tiny and yet she would work very hard, she was careful and helpful, always grateful to those who helped her overcome the continuous worry about the daily survival. She lived with her son Andrea, proud to have been able to give him a better life than hers. With great sacrifices, she got him to go to school until he was 14, when his peers, who often were completely illiterate, were forced since they were very young, to follow the adults to work in the fields, whether it was hot or cold. She raised him very well, he was serious and helpful. During his summer holidays he was the first one to go to the fields to work and if he noticed that she was more tired, she would hurry to finish off his task to go and help her, no matter if the August sun was very hot.

-Lucia is coming…so early…how come?-

Giulia was thinking loud while she was looking out the window. Maria looked out the window too and she felt distressed as she did for the slightest unexpected event, she followed her sister-in-law who had gone to open the door before Lucia had arrived.

-Good morning madam-

Giulia had told her many times not to call her with that epithet but she had realized that Lucia herself was more at her ease keeping up a respectful relationship

-How come you are here so early? Did anything happened?-

Lucia’s lean and austere face was anxious and frightened. She took her by the arm and brought her quietly into the kitchen. She sat and felt that the two women were giving her inquisitive and worried looks

-Something happened tonight…- she said

-What?-

.-A very bad thing-

-Right, but what happened….- Giulia’s mind went over every possible situation and stopped over a terrible thought

-No, no, madams, it is not Andrea, no…- she prayed almost speechless

-They broke into the doctor’s house…-

-It’s not Andrea, it’s not Andrea- was the only thing she could think of, relieved by the biggest burden

-What doctor.. Marinucci?...-

-Yes, dr Marinucci-

-Who broke into the house, Lucia, …please say something-

-Them… the fascists… they knocked down the door… they beat up the doctor and before going they set fire to his surgery–

Giovanni, alarmed by the unusual sounds, had come down and heard everything from the stairs

-What?- he said turning to Lucia even though he understood everything perfectly well Giulia answered- They got into Marinucci’s…-

-How is the doctor? – he interrupted her

-I haven’t seen him. Andrea with Cencio della Menna and Carlone went into his house to help him. They said that he had a split lip and was complaining.-

-I’ll go to see him- Giovanni said, and he was out the house in a flash-

-Be careful, please-.

The words which were repeated many times did not even reach him.

When he got back, he was nearly lunchtime.

Giulia heard the buggy coming back before she could actually see it. She had been waiting all morning to hear that sound, carrying on with her daily routine, constantly looking at the window. The children could sense her tension but only Antonino had dared to ask for an explanation of the situation:

-Is there something wrong, mum?-

She told him what she knew

-I’ll go to the village- it was his reaction.

-You are not going anywhere-

Her reply was authoritative and she would not accept any answer on his part. Antonino understood that if he had insisted, he would have only make that matter worse.

The horse trotting got them all to run out of the house. Andrea also came with Giovanni. The boy looked really scared whereas Giovanni looked worried.

-Well...how is dr Marinucci….what happened…?-

-Dr Marinucci is in bed. He got a great fright and he is in pain. He was attacked around two in the morning. He said he heard somebody knocking hard at the door, he got up thinking that someone was not well and he saw four men he did not know. They pushed him inside the house and started kicking and punching him, shouting:

-You are a bloody subversive, you are going to get it now- they left him on the ground, he was bewildered. He heard them going downstairs in his surgery. The smashed everything then they set fire to it and run away. Luckily enough, all the commotion woke Carlone up who lives nearby. He dashed over and managed to put the fire out, then he called Andrea and Cencio to get some help to put the doctor to bed.

-Why did they do it? Dr Marinucci is an old man who lives on his own and has always been good to everybody. Nobody hates him in the village-

He was so upset he could hardly speak and Giulia was speaking nervously crumpling her apron with her hands.

-Giulia, Giulia- Giovanni said with a tone of desperation in his voice – being good or bad does not mean anything anymore…I don’t even know what is important anymore….do you get it?…What is considered important? –

Nobody could answer that question.

Over the next few days the doctor seemed to recover. He managed to get up and sit in the armchair beside the bed for a while. He was more and more withdrawn, he did not say anything, not a word to accuse his attackers nor to thank who had been by his side, his eyes staring down as to try and forget the world around him.

He passed away this way, in a disheartened silence that not even all the memories of his life could make it better.