Chapter 20

TWENTY

MAY 2019

Tuesday

Together, Tori and Emilio rushed out of the building and down the winding stone staircase. Tori was nervous as she watched Emilio make his way down the steps. He looked so unsteady. She'd discovered long ago on many hiking trips with her frisky pup Albie that going downhill could be harder than going uphill, requiring less stamina but a lot more balance. And as far as stamina went, Emilio's breath grew more labored every time they reached a landing and turned to go down the next flight. Even though the sun had dropped behind the castle and the stairway was heavily shaded, she could still see his forehead and cheeks gleaming with perspiration. She was glad he was guiding her by grasping her elbow—not because she needed assistance but because she hoped it would keep him upright.

Finally they reached the bottom of the staircase and made it to the dock as the final group of castle employees were being loaded onto the boat. They climbed to the upper deck and slid onto one of the benches.

Tori rested her arm on the ledge and looked out over the water. The surface was unsettled, bouncing and swaying as the ferry maneuvered alongside the shore and took off for the mainland.

She turned to face Emilio, who was wiping his forehead with a handkerchief. He swiped it over the bottom half of his face and then tucked it into the back pocket of his pants. "I don't usually take those steps two at a time," he joked.

"I'm sorry," she said. "I didn't mean to hold you up. The time went so fast."

"No need for apologies," he said. "I could use a good workout once in a while. The important thing is, did you find what you were looking for?"

She gave him a sideways look. "I'm not entirely sure," she said. "I think I need some help." She paused, then took a deep, courage-building breath and reached into her shoulder bag. "I think there's something here, but I…" She pulled out the notebook.

His jaw dropped. "You took it?" he hissed. He pushed the notebook face down onto the bench. Then he chuckled and shook his head. "Surely you know that you're not supposed to take things from a museum. Or is that not true in America?"

"No, it's true," she said, matching his chuckle. "But it's in Italian. I couldn't read it, so I had to bring it to you. I'll put it back. I promise."

"Meaning you intend to go there again?"

"I have to," she said. "There are more boxes from Ciani Island. That's the island Giulia went to, the island where my grandmother—the grandmother I grew up with—lived." She went on to tell him about Marilene and all she'd learned when the postcard with the wedding dress arrived at the store.

"So those are the boxes that would have information about Giulia, if there's any information to be had," she concluded. "Let me show you." She started to lift the notebook, but Emilio pressed it down again and glanced around. Evidently satisfied that none of the other staff members on board were close enough to see it or hear their conversation, he removed his hand and nodded.

She opened the notebook. "It's strange, there's only one page," she said. "All the other pages seemed to be torn out. And see—I can make out the name Giulia in the handwriting at least six times. So I think it's about her."

She held it out to him. "Can you read it?"

He removed a pair of wire glasses from the pocket of his museum vest and put them on. Then he took the notebook in both hands, resting the bottom edge on his belly, and scanned the handwriting.

"Well?" she asked.

He squinted a bit, then eyed her, and she could tell he'd read something he thought, for some reason, she might not want to hear.

"It's okay," she told him. "Whatever it says."

He looked at the notebook again and started to translate, his voice gentle. She craned her neck and studied the page, as though she were reading along.

Giulia has betrayed us. I was afraid this would happen, that a stranger would show up and threaten everything I've worked for. I shouldn't have brought her into our house. But what choice did I have? The news about Parissi Island was catastrophic. So many souls dead. That castle, that beautiful place, now a Nazi outpost. It sickened me then, it sickens me now, to think of those soldiers sleeping in those bedrooms, pounding away in their ugly boots.

And then Giulia arrived. My children welcomed her. They had no idea what the world had become, what danger was at our doorstep. They only knew that a pretty young woman on a strange boat had arrived. They are so desperate for company. And she was hurt, the injury to her foot quite bad. When she pulled through, it made the children so happy. Marilene especially. She had no idea of the threat Giulia brought with her, the threat that the Nazis would come after her. Giulia wanted to leave, but I convinced her to stay. I explained how leaving was even more dangerous. If she continued to Anzalea, the Germans would surely have recognized her and sent her to Poland with all the others.

So we saved her life. And now she has betrayed us, and everything again is at risk. God forgive me, perhaps it would have been better if she'd perished on that strange boat of hers. What nightmare has she inflicted on my family? How could she turn on us after all we did to save her? I am not a foolish man, but I behaved like a fool. How did I allow myself to trust her? We will pay for her duplicity and my bad judgment in…

"That's where it ends," Emilio said quietly as he closed the book and lowered it to his lap.

Tori looked down at her hands. The lighthearted mood between them had dissolved. She shivered.

"That must be Marilene's father's notebook," she said. "He was a doctor, she told me all about him. But I don't understand. What could have made him so angry at her? To regret saving her life…"

"I couldn't say…"

"Could she have turned them over to the Nazis? But why would she do that? After they'd saved her?"

Emilio shook his head. "It's impossible to put ourselves in their shoes. People make a lot of questionable decisions when they feel unsafe."

"You think she felt unsafe?"

"Sure, she did," he said. "For one thing, she was a Parissi. One of the three nieces. Patricio was famous, he was the heir to a fortune, a legendary Italian personality. And very much anti-Nazi. Parissi tried to keep his island private, but he had supply boats coming in all the time, and no doubt some of the boatmen took photographs that they sold to newspapers. There is a very famous one, the three nieces all dressed up. The Nazis would have recognized her in an instant."

"I know that picture!" Tori said. "Marilene gave it to me. Giulia must have left it behind, and Marilene took it when she left Italy."

She paused. "Go on," she added. "You said that for one thing, she was a Parissi. Was there another thing? Another reason she'd feel threatened?"

He studied her for a moment. "Tori… do you not know that your grandmother was Jewish?"

Tori felt herself shudder in surprise. "What?"

"Giulia's mother—that would have been your great-grandmother—was Patricio's sister, Olivia. She was disowned by their father for marrying the family's Jewish tailor. Patricio lost contact with her. He didn't know she died until Giulia and her sisters came to the castle and told him."

"Olivia," Tori murmured. "My mother's name was Olive. Giulia named her daughter after her mother." She shook her head. "I had no idea she was Jewish. Why wouldn't Marilene have told me?"

"Maybe she didn't know," Emilio said. "She was a child and quite sheltered on that island, according to this notebook."

Tori looked back out at the water. The news about Giulia made her story more complicated. And it raised new questions. Marilene's family had taken such a risk, hiding her grandmother. The Nazis would have wanted her, both because she was a Parissi and because her father was Jewish. Giulia had to have known what a liability she was to this family. They had rescued her, and Marilene's father had treated her injury, which must have happened as she was fleeing from Parissi Island. What had she done to betray the Ciani family—and why would she have wronged the very people who had saved her ?

Planning her trip here to Italy, Tori had thought the worst of her grandmother. She'd developed a whole picture in her head—cold, mean, and unspeakably selfish, for abandoning her daughter. Still, Tori had held out hope that she was wrong, that there was a reasonable explanation for why Giulia had stayed away. But this revelation from Dr. Ciani's notebook made the odds of such an explanation very small. And the picture in Tori's head seemed increasingly likely to be accurate. Had she betrayed someone who had helped her? Did Tori even want to know the truth?

She turned back to Emilio. "How do you know all this?"

He smiled. "Everyone around here knows this. Anzalea was built around the Parissi family. They were what kept everyone in business. The markets supplied the island with food, the port was busy all the time accepting shipments of furniture, bedding, and garments to ferry out to the island. Mostly to Parissi Island but to some of the smaller islands in this area, too. Travelers who were going to the castle to work often stayed in our town for a night until they were summoned. Entertainers—musicians, singers, performers of one kind or another—traveled through here on their way to be part of the castle's festivities. Builders, electricians, plumbers—they all stopped in Anzalea. Parissi Island was like a thriving city, and our community thrived because of it.

"My family, too—we owned a little market connected to the house," he added. "Where the breakfast room is now—that was a dry goods market. My grandfather had a boat, and it was my father's job to take supplies out to the island. They'd meet up with the boathouse workers there and learn all about what was going on. My father did that for years, until Parissi Island was invaded."

He looked down at his notebook. "Funny, right?" he said. "This notebook Pietro Ciani kept—see how it only has one page, the page with the writing? I've seen this before. People were so uncertain back then—on the one hand, they wanted to memorialize things, and on the other hand, they were scared. Can you imagine what would have happened if the Nazis landed on his island and found this page? Pietro wouldn't have been able to deny that he knew Giulia was a Parissi and a Jew—and the fact that he was hiding her in his home would have been disastrous. These dual drives to keep records and to keep everything hidden. So much quiet, so many secrets. It's not natural. I think—now, I don't know this for sure—but I suspect he wrote pages from this notebook, then thought better of it and tore them out to hide, so no one would know what he'd done until years in the future. Maybe he was planning to hide this page, too. Maybe he never got around to it."

Tori took the notebook and ran her fingers along the ripped edge inside, where the missing pages were. "You think he did that?" she asked.

"It's possible. You know, there was a housekeeper at Parissi Island. Signora Russo, her name was. She's a hero now. Nobody knew it at the time except a very few people, but she was a spy for the Resistance. She would send messages about the German forces to the Americans moving northward from Sicily. And it wasn't until recently that this was discovered. She'd had all kinds of information about the castle—who the guests were, what life was like, how the household was organized—that she hid in closets and under floorboards. That's how much of the castle's history was learned. From Signora Russo's hidden messages."

Tori looked out toward the water again, feeling hot tears stinging her eyes. Once again, the emotion she felt surprised her. She didn't become emotional like this at home. But it was heartbreaking, that there were heroes like Signora Russo, who gave their lives to help defeat the Nazis. And like Marilene's father, who put his family in danger by taking Giulia in when she'd washed ashore after fleeing the Nazi invasion of Parissi Island. And then, it seemed, there were people like her grandmother, Giulia. People whose worst instincts rose up when they were most fiercely tested. People who could betray those who had helped them.

She felt Emilio pat her hand, which was resting on the bench near him. "Don't despair, Tori," he said. "You've uncovered a tiny puzzle piece. The puzzle may look far different when you see the whole thing."

She looked back at him wryly, grateful for his attempt to cheer her up but not buying his argument.

"I mean it," he told her. "I've been on this earth for a long time. Much longer than you. And I learn something every day. And one of the things I've learned is that it's not what we say that tells the story. It's what we keep secret. Take my father, for instance. Have you met him back at the hotel yet?"

She shook her head.

"You will," he said. "Now, this is a man who went through the war, who was living right here on the mainland around the time that Parissi Island was stormed. And yet he has never spoken about those years. We know only that he ended up in Switzerland, where he met my mother, and they went on to live in England, where my sisters and I were born. I've spent a lifetime wishing he'd tell us what he went through. How did he manage during the war? Was he even in Italy during the Nazi occupation? He never says a word about it. I think he fears reliving it. But by holding it in, I believe he relives it every day."

"I'm sorry," Tori said.

"I don't tell you this to make you feel bad for us," he said. "All in all, my father's life was more good than bad. I tell you this only to give you something to take with you. It's what we hide that causes all the misery. At least, that's what I think. If you want to know someone's story, if you want to know the sources of someone's choices, don't listen only to what's said. Learn what they hide .

"Give Giulia a chance," he said. "There's still much that's hidden."

They arrived at the dock, and she put the notebook back into her bag, then followed Emilio off the boat and onto the dock. The little town was alive in the twilight, the bars and cafés hopping, the lights outside each establishment twinkling.

"I'm going to have a drink, see who's out and about tonight before I turn in," he said. "Join me?"

She shook her head. "No, thank you. I'm tired and need to get some sleep. And I need to call home. I miss my daughter."

He nodded and tapped her shoulder. "Don't go to bed hungry," he said. "My daughter can send up a nice meal to you. Tell her I said so."

"Thank you," she said. He waved and headed toward the strip of restaurants, and Tori began the short walk along the piazza and over to the hotel. Though she had found the town so charming last night, it didn't hold the same magic now. She was touched by what Emilio had said, about how people's secrets were more important than what they shared. Was he right? Were the secrets the key to understanding people? The key to understanding what Giulia had done? And why?

If that was so, then she had to get back into the archives. Tomorrow and maybe multiple times. Because the boxes there held secrets. And those secrets could be the key to learning about Giulia and maybe even finding her whereabouts.

She walked into the hotel, determined to convince Emilio to sneak her again into the archives.

There were still at least a dozen more boxes she needed to open.