“Good thing you’re not getting this farm, Katharina. What did you think you were going to do with it as a spinster? Huh? Just wouldn’t have been right.”
He licked his finger before turning his back on her.
If the Thalerhof were hers—like it should be—she’d march to the barn right now, fetch Opa’s rifle out of its hiding place, and chase Toni all the way into the valley and across the border herself.
Toni was addressing the men again. “You throw your hat in with us, Johannes, and we’ll get a resistance going, but you make good and sure you know who’s in the fight with you.”
At the door, he pressed his hat on his head, buzzard feather quivering, before facing Florian. “Many thanks for the wine, but my terms for the bull haven’t changed. Take it or leave it.”
Chapter 2
Bolzano, November 1922
O n their way back from Castel Roncolo, Angelo walked with Marco and Chiara along the Talvera River. Below the promenade, the current swept branches and twigs, fallen leaves, and someone’s handkerchief southwards, a late-autumn migration. To their left, the vineyards were already stripped of their fruit. Between the Bolzano hills, the chimneys of the Rosengarten range rose dusty and brown with just the slightest glaze of snow.
Chiara stopped and gazed at Castel Roncolo behind them. “It’s rather imposing, is it not?”
Angelo liked it. It had flair. “I find it elegant, even Italian-like.”
“I heard that the family turned it into their summer residence in the fourteenth century.” She leaned into him, and her hair caught the November sunlight and blended with the tones of her russet dress.
Having her like this gave him pleasure, something rare between them these days. In his other arm, he pressed Marco to him, who giggled and took Angelo’s face into both his hands and gave him a clumsy kiss. His soft black curls tickled, and Angelo brought Marco’s head closer to kiss him back.
Chiara looked back at the palace while stroking the boy’s leg. “I suppose there is something gay about it. Maybe the castle’s taken on the spirit of its function, as a holiday residence, that is. If you believe in spirits, that is.”
“I believe in good engineering.” He held his arm out for her.
They moved along the river, and he wanted to take off his coat the way Chiara had her feathered cape. It lay in Marco’s otherwise empty pram, the ecru and black feathers making it look as if they were harbouring an exotic swan. He set his son onto the gravel path, and Marco beelined into the field. The air was crisp with the scents of autumn. The chestnut trees had dropped their fanlike leaves, and Marco toddled through them, trying to kick them up as he had seen his father do earlier. Angelo chased after him, caught him, and whipped him into the air, raising his son high. The bare tree branches stretched out like a web behind Marco. When Angelo looked back at his wife, she was smiling in a way he had not seen in a long time. Too long. November was the skeleton ready to be shrouded by winter, but Chiara looked like the splendour of October. He wanted to talk to her again about a brother or sister for Marco. He wanted to close the divide between them and be intimate with his wife again.
Returning to her, he saw Chiara was already pointing the pram for home. Angelo grew tense. Here in the park, he was just a man spending time with his wife and son. As soon as they headed for the villa, he’d slip into a world over which he had no control, a world where he and Chiara fought in relative silence. He kept his association with the Blackshirts from her, which was easy, for she was always engrossed in her newspapers and letters. Since the Bolzano Fair and the Tyrolean fatalities, political tensions had grown worse. Much worse. There had been quite the public outcry from the Tyroleans, but the Fascists who now occupied the Alto Adige quickly quashed any revolts. Violence erupted often, and after an attack on him by a mob of Blackshirts, Count Edmond was now in exile. With Mussolini ruling from Rome, Chiara’s letters of protest were dangerous, and a layer of fear infused the house. Except today. Today they had succeeded in leaving it all behind.
“We should have brought a picnic,” he said.
“I hadn’t thought it would be so warm.”
“I could go back and ask the cook to put something together.”
She seemed to think about it, and he let her, stopping to gaze at the castle once more. He wanted to stay here with his family and find something that would keep them together. It would take more than a picnic, but that might be the beginning. He turned back to persuade her, but Marco was in the pram, and Chiara had the swanlike cape over her shoulders, pushing for home.
***
A steady drip of rain on the windowpanes interrupted Angelo’s reading, and he checked his office clock. Noon. The outing with Chiara and Marco the day before seemed years ago now that the weather had turned.
He rubbed his eyes. After lunch he would have to take a nap before coming back to the office.
He heard a door open at the far end of the hallway, and footsteps paraded past his office. Someone knocked at what must have been Pietro’s door. Angelo turned back to the structural report he’d been reading on the Gleno Dam and hoped their lunch break would not be delayed. He’d reached the last page when the door opened and closed again, followed by the footsteps once more. The party stopped outside of Angelo’s office and spoke with hushed voices before moving on. When it was silent, Angelo took his coat off the hook, glad that Pietro and he would
