The Lost Catacomb (34 page)
“
Silenzio
,
”
Rostoni cautioned in a
soft whisper as he quietly opened the door of the black sedan.
The car
’
s headlights had been extinguished the moment they'd
left the precincts of the crumbling Aurelian walls and made their way, in the
stealth of night, towards the catacombs of the Via Appia Pignatelli.
They'd traveled in a silent convoy, as
Rostoni
’
s driver,
a carefully chosen acquaintance of his older brother, a captain in the
Trastevere branch of the
Fascio
, had led the five trucks towards the
deserted outskirts of Rome.
The convoy had parked in the shelter of some thick trees and
densely tangled shrubbery, well shielded from the road and from the view of any
army patrols that might be scouring the area to pick up possible curfew
offenders.
Rostoni had researched
the location of these catacombs persistently over the past several months,
visiting the Secret Archives on a regular basis, ostensibly for the purpose of
studying epigraphic and literary sources concerned with the worship of martyrs
in underground basilicas.
The
catacombs of the Via Appia Pignatelli had been discovered in 1885, but all
traces of the precise location of its entrance had vanished long ago, the
result of the shifting and collapse of some of its multi-layered
gallerias
in
the wake of silent, but nonetheless destructive, earth tremors.
Rostoni had made several field trips to the area over the
past few weeks, under the guise of pilgrimages to the catacombs of St. Calixtus
and St. Sebastian, and his relentless efforts had finally borne fruit.
His discovery of the entrance, which had
been well concealed beneath a jagged pile of rocks, overgrown with tall weeds
and lush wildflowers, was well timed.
A steady flow of goods had been shipped out of Athens ever
since the Axis occupation of Greece, arriving first at a little used port in a
small fishing village along the Adriatic coast of Italy and then being
transported to the secret headquarters of Catholic Charities International, a
front for fenced artwork that Rostoni had helped establish, with the financial
and logistical assistance of Field Marshal Kesselring, under direct orders from
Berlin.
Rostoni
’
s contacts in Zurich
had arranged for the transfer of valuables from the secret depths of their bank
vaults to coincide precisely with the delivery of these shipments to an
abandoned warehouse near the Via Tasso in Rome.
“
Over
there,
”
he
pointed, as the group of
Waffen
SS unloaded a series of oddly sized
wooden crates from the lorries and set them down in the grass.
“
The
contents are fragile,
”
Rostoni
warned them.
“
And irreplaceable.
Carry the crates down slowly and one at
a time.
Place them in the
loculi
,
if at all possible. You may turn on your flashlights only when you enter the
crypt.
I
’
ve rigged some lighting in the main
hypogeum.
There
’
s a switch at the bottom of the stairs.
“
Giovanni,
”
he now whispered,
turning to his Italian colleague and beckoning him deep into the shadows.
“
I
’
ll take the sedan back
to Trastevere.
When they
’
ve finished
transferring the boxes, you know what to do.
Take them back to
Fascio
headquarters
and give them a round of drinks, to celebrate the completion of their
mission.
And make sure that they
are served only the
grappa
that I
’
ve prepared especially for this purpose.
“
The
drugs have a delayed effect and simulate the symptoms of severe food
poisoning.
By midday tomorrow,
”
he said with a
sinister glance in the direction of the German soldiers,
“
there will be no
eyewitnesses left to this night
’
s
events.
”
The veranda of the Keating home had always been a place where
the family relaxed in the evening hours when the weather was fine, sitting on
deep wicker armchairs and a matching sofa with well-worn needlepoint
pillows.
Several low glass-topped
tables held books and magazines, and a small flowering plant trailed its leaves
over the edge of a salt-glazed pottery jug.
The view from the porch took in a broad expanse of grass,
dotted here and there with large maple and oak trees that even now, in early
May, had begun to put forth their green leaves, brightening the landscape with
the promise of the renewal of spring.
Near a corner of the veranda, a small wooden birdhouse, built twenty
years earlier in a gesture of whimsy to mimic the architecture of the Keating
home, now echoed with the soft warbling sounds of the birds that had returned
from their winter habitats.
Elena had come outside with a large mug of steaming tea in
her hand, settling herself into a chair and sighing in contentment.
The night air was cool, and she wore a
light sweater, unbuttoned, over her shoulders.
She was now at the beginning of her
final month of pregnancy and looked forward to giving birth with mixed feelings
of anticipation and dread.
Her months with the Keating family had been like an oasis in
time, far removed from the horrors of war that she had known back in
Italy.
Though the radio in the
Keating
’
s kitchen
was constantly turned on, transmitting the latest progress of the Allied
forces, and though Tom had made several mysterious trips back to England over
the past months on missions he declined to discuss, the atmosphere in the house
was tranquil.
Tom
’
s
parents asked few questions, having been told by their son that Elena would not
wish to speak of her family nor of the terrible loss she had sustained.
They respected his wish to provide
little detail about how he had met his young wife, who seemed to be scarcely
beyond adolescence.
Somewhat
puzzled, they had also noticed, without comment, that there were no public
displays of physical affection between the two, no playful flirtation of the
sort that most young married couples would indulge in, even in front of others.
Perhaps most mystifying was their daughter-in-law
’
s almost habitual state
of somber introspection.
Not that
she was moody or unfriendly, or that she failed to respond to the warmth of
their repeated overtures, but clearly she was sad most of the time, preoccupied
and grieving, they could only assume, for her parents and brother.
And they could not fail to notice that when Tom was actually
home on one of his brief furloughs, he slept in a different bedroom, in the
guest room down the hall from where Elena slept alone in the large double bed
that had always been Tom
’
s.
Was her pregnancy such a source of physical discomfort that
this was the only way she could get a good night
’
s sleep?
Didn
’
t she
long for the comfort of her husband
’
s
arms at night during those infrequent intervals when he could actually be with
her?
And though Tom
’
s
mother hesitated to even think the unthinkable, she wondered if the baby was
actually Tom
’
s.
Perhaps Elena had been violated by the
same Fascist soldiers who had murdered the rest of her family, and perhaps Tom,
their heroic son who always did the right thing, had simply rescued her from
further tragedy, from the terrible situation in which he had found her, without
thought as to his own personal welfare.
Any marriage was a big step, tenuous enough in the best of
situations, and a marriage of convenience could be a difficult thing to live
with in the long run.
Given their
son
’
s reticence,
however, and his protectiveness of Elena, they might never know.
As for Elena herself, her trepidation about motherhood was
twofold.
She was somewhat fearful
of the birth itself.
After all, she
was young and it would be her first delivery.
She had no idea what to expect,
especially in a strange country where hospital protocol could differ
dramatically from what went on in Europe, where many women still gave birth at
home, supported by the warmth of the family circle, their mothers soothing and
encouraging them at every step during the difficult hours of labor and
confinement.
What would happen to her poor baby if she did not survive the
birth?
And what if the baby looked
like Niccol
ò—
which
she hoped desperately it would
—
but
she were dead?
How would Tom
’
s parents feel about
caring for it until the war ended and Tom returned home?
How would Tom himself feel, burdened with
a child that wasn
’
t
his and that might look like Elena
’
s
dead lover?
And if she were to survive the baby
’
s delivery after all, would she really have the
strength, both emotional and physical, to go off on her own?
To make a new life for herself in America?
She knew that she could never return to
Rome, even if the war were to end in the Allies
’
favor, for she would always fear discovery by those
who had destroyed her family and murdered her beloved Niccol
ò
.
She no longer believed in any sort of divine justice or
retribution that would exact punishment from those who willfully hurt others
and gloried in their pain.
Her
faith in God
’
s
providence, His divine love, His putative protection of His flock
—
all had been
shaken with terrible finality to their very foundations and would never be
restored.
There was nothing left
for her back in Italy.
She had no
family, no home, and she could no longer find solace in formal religion.
But what would become of her here in America?
She had no education to speak of, since
her high school studies had been interrupted.
How could she support herself?
She didn
’
t see how her dream of a career in medicine could
ever be possible now.
Not with a
baby whom she would devote her life to, and not in a country whose language she
spoke adequately, though not well enough for professional purposes.
Likewise, she realized, the contents of the small leather
satchel she had brought with her from her parents
’
ransacked apartment in Rome would never cover the
cost of an education in the United States.
So far, the money and jewelry had been left untouched, thanks to Tom
’
s generosity.
She would use it only to provide for her
baby, as necessary.
She could not impose upon Tom and his parents forever.
It was unfair to Tom especially, who deserved
to be with someone who loved him more than anyone else in the world.
He was so kind, so giving, so
strong.
And he had taken such
good care of her from the moment they had met.
If circumstances had been different, he
might, in fact, have swept her off her feet.
But through all these difficult months she had not forgotten
—
she could not
forget
—
her
young lover, her sweet Niccol
ò
,
whose broken body rested somewhere in an unmarked grave.
What a wonderful father he would
have made, she reflected for the hundredth time.
How happy they would have been had he
not been snatched by the rapacious jaws of death.
As she sat on the veranda, lost in thought, her mug of tea
now cold, ignored for the moment as it rested on a low table, she felt the baby
move.
Its tiny feet kicked and
thumped against her as it shifted restlessly inside.
Almost reflexively, she placed her hands
on her firm, well-rounded belly and smiled through her tears.
Suddenly the screen door opened behind her, and Tom walked
out to the porch.
“
Surprise,
”
he said gently.
“
I
’
m home.
An unanticipated leave.
”
She held out her hand and wordlessly motioned to him to join
her on the wicker loveseat where she rested.
They sat in companionable silence, gazing across the lawn
towards the distant oaks, whose tiny leaves rustled softly, murmuring their
secrets in the night air.
High
above the trees, the darkened sky was sprinkled with a thousand stars,
recounting the tales of human joy and suffering that they had told from time
immemorial.
“
Look,
Elena,
”
Tom
said.
He pointed towards the North
Star and remarked in a philosophical vein that was rare for him and that
surprised Elena,
“
For
centuries hunters and sailors have been guided by its light and found their way
home.
“
You
know what one of our most famous poets once said, don
’
t you?
That it
’
s a
metaphor for love, that
‘
it
is the star to every wandering bark whose worth
’
s unknown, although his height be taken.
’
That it guides us through the
vicissitudes and storms of life,
‘
even
to the edge of doom.
’
“
Sorry,
”
he said with a rueful
smile.
“
Must be this God-awful war that
’
s getting to me.
I don
’
t usually sound like this.
”
“
It
’
s been a long time
since I thought about the stars,
”
Elena replied after a moment, her voice low and husky with regret.
“
My
. . . my boyfriend,
”
she
said with hesitation, her hand resting on her baby
’
s softly curved bulk,
“
my boyfriend . . . Niccol
ò
.
.
.
once brought a telescope to our
apartment and showed me the constellations.
He could find almost all of them on a
clear night.
It was one of his main
interests
—
astronomy.
”
She paused for a moment, almost reluctant to continue.
But it had been so long since she had
confided in anyone, no one since Mother Teresa, in fact, that she went on, not
even waiting to see if he was really interested in hearing more.
“
His
favorite constellation was Andromeda.
The story appealed to his sense of romance, I guess.
Poor doomed Andromeda,
”
she sighed sadly.
“
A hideous sea monster waiting to devour her.
A
deus ex machina
in the form of
the heroic Perseus.
”
Tears filled her eyes as she turned to Tom.
“
He needed a Perseus
himself.
But no one came to his
aid.
Nor to my parents
’
,
”
she added
bitterly.
“
Nor to my poor brother Giulio
’
s.
“
Thank
God you came to mine and my baby
’
s.
I owe you my life.
”
She fell silent now, and he took her small hand in his and
squeezed it reassuringly.
He
understood.
There was no need for
words.
In an almost unconscious movement, she leaned against his
shoulder and looked out in the direction of Andromeda and the distant
stars.
She tried to listen to
what they whispered to her in barely audible tones, far away, shimmering in
magnificent solitude among the cold reaches of infinity.
