Now Gino reaches out and stops Cesare, breaking him out of his reverie just before they get to the camp. There is a guard on the gate, standing in the shadows, and both of them wait to see who it is. Now that they have shown they can be trusted, the Italians are given a little more freedom to roam, but that is no consolation if Angus MacLeod is in charge. Twice now, he’s seen Cesare returning to the camp late, and has given him instructions to come to the quarry the next morning, rather than going up to the chapel.
Tonight they are in luck: the guard is young and nervous. Although he keeps his hand on his baton, he lets them past without stopping them.
Back in his hut, the rest of the men are asleep. Cesare is cold, as he climbs into his bunk – he is always cold in this northern land, but he prays to distract himself. He prays for the skill to make the chapel as beautiful as he imagines it; he prays for his family’s safety. He prays for the chance to be able to hold Dorotea’s hand again. To be able to tell her that he is sorry for whatever he has done to hurt her.
Some nights, he prays for the war to be over, but then he tries to imagine returning to Italy, leaving Dorotea in this place; everything he pictures is a gaping blank. Without her, returning home would be a descent into darkness.
In the morning, late frost rimes the inside of his hut. The winter has been long and Cesare has almost forgotten the feeling of waking up warm. Now, his muscles are stiff with cold, but he feels no reluctance at getting up. The chapel calls to him, as it does to all of the men in his hut. They grin at each other and dress quickly before starting up the hill in the weak sunlight.
Cesare walks alongside them, feeling comfort and ease, as if he’s known them for years. It is strange how this place has brought them together and made them into something new. Before they came here, they were strangers from different parts of Italy who had joined the fight for different reasons: some liked the idea of defending their country, and others were so poor that the regular meals and pay were impossible to ignore. A very few were Fascists, who scrawled Il Duce into the rocks on the quarry walls and the metal sides of their huts. But most were just ordinary men, who wanted to make sure their families were safe – safe from this nameless, faceless enemy. And now they are here, and their differences don’t matter because they’re building something together. And the enemy has a face, but it isn’t the face they expected. The enemy is MacLeod with his baton, but it is also Major Bates’s kindnesses. It is the nurses who care for them. It is the twin girls with their long red hair and their anxious smiles.
Nothing is as they expected.
The sight of the chapel, on the breast of the hill, never fails to take Cesare’s breath away. Although it is only half covered with cement, and looks like some weather-ravaged rock formation, he can make out the beginning of the façade of a church: he can picture the pillars around the doorway, which will welcome weary travellers; he can imagine the pointed arch with its pediment, its cornice. They will paint it white, with flashes of red. It will be visible from miles away; far-off sailors will see it in war and in peace. Cesare will embed a sculpture of Christ’s face above the doorway. It will remain on this island long after he is gone.
I can’t leave without her. By winter, the barriers will be finished.
He shakes off the thought, instructs Gino and Marco to continue mixing the cement for the front of the chapel. All the men begin to work happily, and much faster than they ever have in the quarry. Cesare goes into the chapel and continues painting the grey plasterboard white. In some places, he paints over the pencil marks where he has sketched out faint designs. He covers the outline of a hawk, a lion and a crow. There is no purpose in having the images there without coloured paints.
The concrete altar will be finished today – Alberto and Aureliano are hunched over it, smoothing layer after layer of cement over the surface. They flash quick grins at Cesare, and return to their task. Both men are utterly engrossed in creating something beautiful. Far off, from the direction of the quarry, comes the boom of another explosion.
Above the altar, there is a pencil outline of a woman’s face. Her expression is serene, but her eyes are fierce. And in Cesare’s mind she has long red hair. He puts the brush of white paint to the image, ready to cover it, but stops himself. How can he paint her out, as if she never existed? She is somewhere on this island. Perhaps, sometimes, she thinks of him.
Later, after Alberto and Aureliano finish pressing the last layer of cement onto the altar, Father Ossani leads all the men into the chapel.
Cesare has put lanterns under the altar. From a distance, they look like the most intricate decorated boxes, with beautiful patterns carved and etched into the metal. Cesare has crafted them carefully, so that the light from the candles casts flickering patterns up the whitewashed walls. It is only by examining
