“She won’t serve dinner for hours,” Gianni said. “Not until the sun is well and truly set. You will faint from hunger before that.” He got up and went into the darkness of the trattoria. Then he came back, looking self-satisfied. “They will bring a tray for us. Very good here, you will see.”

I had no idea what bruschetta was. My knowledge of Italian food was limited to spaghetti Bolognese or ravioli of the sort one bought in a tin. Soon a platter was carried out to our table by a skinny young man wearing an apron. On it were thick slices of toasted bread with different toppings. Gianni looked at me with intense interest and said something under his breath to one of the men. The man replied. They exchanged a smile. A translation was not offered to me.

“So now you try the bruschetta,” the distinguished older man said. “Each one is crowned with different flavours that we like in these parts. This one has chicken liver mixed with anchovy, this one tapenade, and this slices of fennel with goat cheese. Eat. They are all good.”

I was all too aware that I was going back to Paola to eat what would undoubtedly be a large meal, but I could hardly refuse. They insisted that I try every flavour, watching my face with expressions of anticipation so that I had to smile broadly and nod satisfaction after each bite. This was not hard to do as each of the flavours was exquisite. I had grown up with simple English cooking—steak and kidney pie, shepherd’s pie, fish and chips, lamb chops—and then as a student my daring experiments in the culinary line were limited by my budget and included Chinese and Indian (or rather the English versions of Chinese and Indian). Therefore I was not familiar with garlic or basil or any of the other tastes I was experiencing. At last, full of food and wine, I was able to plead that Paola would be waiting for me and it would be very rude to be late for dinner.

Gianni, who had volunteered to show me his sheep farm and had insisted on the bruschetta, immediately got to his feet. “I shall have the honour of escorting the young lady home,” he said.

“Oh no, thank you. It is not far and I know the way, and it is still not quite dark,” I said, having trouble with finding Italian words after too much wine.

“It is no trouble,” Gianni said. “I, too, must go home through the tunnel. Come.”

He put a hand on my elbow and assisted me to my feet. I wasn’t too keen to go through a long, dark tunnel with him, even though I didn’t think he’d try anything within shouting distance of the men at the table. Luckily this was decided for me before I could find a way to refuse him.

“Never mind, Gianni,” a voice at the end of the table said. I looked across at a big man in a well-worn undershirt. “I must pass Paola’s house, and it is time for me to leave if I do not want a lashing from my wife’s tongue. Come, Signorina, you will be quite safe with me. I have ten children and a terrifying wife to keep me in line.”

There was good-natured laughter around the table, but the white-haired one said, “Yes, Signorina, you will be quite safe with Alberto.”

I thanked them profusely for their hospitality and remembered to comment again on the quality of their olive oil. This was met with broad smiles all around. At least I had done something right.

“So tomorrow, Signorina.” Gianni still hovered beside me. “Any time you want to see my sheep and my cheese making, you come and find me, okay? I can tell you lots of interesting things, also about the wartime.”

“What do you know of the war?” one of them bellowed. “You were just a child. We were off fighting. We can tell her what the war was like.”

“I was a child, yes, but I ran errands. I took messages for the partisans. I saw much,” Gianni said. “You would be interested, I think, Signorina.”

“You and your tall tales.” Alberto shoved him aside and took my arm to lead me away from the group.

“That Gianni, he is full of hot air,” Alberto said to me. “You must take anything he says with a pinch of salt, Signorina. In the wartime he ran messages, but they were more likely to be for the black market dealers than the partisans. No partisan would have trusted him with an important message. He’d have blabbed about it to the wrong people and squealed to the Germans if they had questioned him.”

We walked then in silence across the piazza and through the tunnel. I suspected that he was now tongue-tied and perhaps was already wondering what the shrewish wife would say about being seen with a young lady. On the other side of the tunnel we emerged into the last of the pink twilight. Bats were flitting and swooping silently across our path, attacking the mosquitoes that now hummed around us. We reached the path to Paola’s front door.

“Here we are, Signorina,” Alberto said. “May I wish you a good appetite for your evening meal and a good sleep.” He gave a quaintly old-fashioned bow and then strode off down the path that led to the valley.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

HUGO

December 1944

In the middle of the night Hugo awoke with teeth chattering. His whole body was shivering and shaking. He sat up and felt around for Guido’s shirt that he had stuffed into the parachute bag under his head. It took him a while to extricate it, take off his bomber jacket, then put the shirt on. It smelled of damp sheep but was actually nicely dry. By the time he got the jacket on again he could not control the shaking. He tried to huddle himself into a ball, but it was impossible with his splinted leg.