Luigi Bosco, husband of Maria’s friend Alice, owner of the coveted radio and an adviser to Marco in his dealings with city officials, had been a fascist from the early days, when Mussolini broke from the socialist party and established his journal, Il Popolo d’Italia. Luigi had risen to local power on the wave of anti-Russian, pro-military sentiment that fueled the fascist takeover of the state. Maria disliked Luigi, but he was useful to the family, especially during food shortages and for travel documents. Shortly after the German occupation, when the local fascists at last had the power to take vengeance on anyone who had ever offended them, Luigi Bosco had made a quick trip to Rome and returned with a young woman named Silvia Gracchi, whom he described as a paying tenant. A brilliant painter, he claimed, a niece of yet another cousin, Silvia had come to Firenze to study art. She moved in with the Bosco family, Luigi, Alice, and their two teenage daughters, close friends of Beatrice. Silvia declared herself relieved to be out of Rome. Romans were starving, everyone knew that; bread on the black market cost ten times what it used to, and meat was unheard of unless you kept a pig or a goat in your courtyard, the resort of some poorer families on the outskirts, so the presence of this tenant-relative was unsurprising. She was eighteen years old, slender, elegant, with dark hair and shiny brown eyes that were gold in a certain light, like coins. Her manner was mild, interior; she often paused before speaking, as if waiting to hear what she was about to say. She spoke several languages, including German. Beatrice was fascinated by her. She seemed mature beyond her years, quietly confident. She never argued or raised her voice. Of course, Beatrice thought, that was because she was really a paying guest in her relatives’ house, and also because she was a Roman and had a more cosmopolitan view of the world.
Silvia and Alice Bosco had dined at the Salviati palazzo that hot night when Marco came in red-faced and sweating with the news that the Germans had evacuated everyone who lived within a mile of the Arno. Upward of 10,000 citizens were wandering the streets, and many had barged into the cool marble rooms of the Palazzo Pitti, where the museum director agreed they could lay down cots amid the treasures and glowering statues, as well as beneath the portico and in the cortile, which faced away from the Arno. “What does it mean?” Beatrice cried. Marco hung his head, wiped his brow.
“They’re going to blow up the bridges,” Maria said. “To keep the Americans from following them.” She sneered at her brother. “What will your lot do when your German masters aren’t here to protect you?”
“My teacher lives near Ponte Santa Trinita,” Beatrice said. The sound of men shouting drifted in from the street, coming closer and closer, and then there was the thudding of the heavy knocker on the door.
“It’s Luigi,” Marco said, going out hurriedly. “I told him to meet us here. We can see what’s happening from the roof.”
The women stood silent, gazing at one another. Celestia burst into tears, and Valeria passed her arm around her sister’s waist. “Let’s go to our room,” she counseled. “And close the shutters.”
* * *
“So that night,” Beatrice told me, “we all went up to the roof and watched the Nazis blow up the bridges. Luigi Bosco was as pale as a statue; somehow he’d told himself Firenze would be spared. Marco was pretending it all made perfect sense; the Germans had no choice, they must protect their rear as they advanced to the Gothic Line. There they would be joined by reinforcements loyal to the Duce, who was hiding out in his phony kingdom on Lago di Garda. Everyone knew it was a perfect rout, most of all the Germans, who were methodical as machines. They’d spent the day laying charges all along the Arno, looting stores, and stealing petrol to fuel their vehicles. We climbed up the narrow steps to the roof. I always loved to be up there—we hung our clothes to dry there, the one chore I ever volunteered for—because of the view. We could see the city laid out before us like a picture book, with the towers of the Duomo and the Palazzo Vecchio looming over the rooftops. There was a blackout, the streets were dark, the sky was black overhead, and it was so hot the air pressed like damp velvet against the skin. We gathered near the ledge and looked southwest, toward the river. Buildings blocked our view, but when the first explosion went off with a boom and a bright cloud swirling with white dust rose above the rooftops to the west of us, we all knew what it was. ‘It’s the Ponte Vittoria,’ Luigi said. Marco looked at his watch and said, ‘It’s ten to ten.’ I wondered then how long it would take, how the explosions and the bright columns of smoke might change as they moved closer to us.
“It took all night. With each explosion, one of us called out the familiar name. ‘They have blown up the Ponte Carraia,’ my mother announced. ‘That’s the Ponte Vespucci,’ Marco said. ‘They’re not going west to east.’ Then Alice Bosco turned toward a loud boom coming from east of us. ‘It’s San Niccolò,’ she said. There were long pauses, hours, in between, while we stood stunned, patiently waiting for the next explosion. Suddenly two deep booms sounded to the north, far from the river, and we all turned to see more sparks and smoke surging heavenward. Silvia Gracchi clutched her head between her hands, crying out with great feeling, ‘Oh no. Oh God, they have destroyed the synagogue.’
“Our eyes turned upon her like a pack of dogs simultaneously scenting a rabbit. We all fell quiet as she stood there, sobbing into her palms. Then my mother turned to Luigi and laughed. ‘So this explains your tenant,’ she said. ‘I should have known.’ ”
Here Beatrice paused and took a swallow of wine while the import of her story sank into my brain.
“She was Jewish,” I said.
“She was a Jew,” she agreed. “Hiding out in the local fascist official’s house. Luigi had gone to Rome when the Germans started arresting Jews. I don’t know why he agreed to do it, but he had some papers forged for her and brought her out. Gracchi wasn’t her real name.”
“Was she really a relative?”
Beatrice shrugged. “Perhaps,” she said. “I never knew.”
“What happened to her?”
“The Germans never found her. Her family was sent to Germany in the roundup in Rome and none of them came back. After the war I think she went to America.”
It was my turn to be silent, and I took the opportunity, sipping from my wineglass, to imagine the little group of family and neighbors and the mysterious young tenant from Rome all gathered on a rooftop to watch their ancient city being systematically destroyed.
“I haven’t thought of that night in years,” Beatrice said. “A few days later the New Zealanders and the South Africans poured in, waving and handing out chocolate from their tanks and trucks. Some of them were Maori warriors with tattooed faces; it was too bizarre. But we stood on the street and hung out the windows waving back at them. For us, the war was over.”