The Shoemaker's Wife(47)

“One hundred and ninety pounds,” he said.

“Markings?”

“None.”

“Whooping cough?”

“No.”

“Dysentery?”

“No.”

As the nurse rattled off every illness on her list, Ciro realized he’d never been sick as a child. Sister Teresa had shored him up with egg creams and chestnut paste.

The nurse flipped the page on her clipboard. “Teeth?”

“My own.”

The nurse smiled. Ciro grinned back at her.

“And fine teeth they are,” she said.

The doctor listened to Ciro’s heart with a stethoscope, asking Ciro to move his money pouch to the side to give him access. He asked Ciro to take a deep breath and listened from the back. He checked Ciro’s eyes with a small light, and his neck with his fingers. “Move him through,” the doctor said in English.

Ciro moved through the metal gates to the next line. He heard attending officers asking the immigrants simple questions: Where are you from? How much is six plus six? Where does the sun rise? Where does it set? Some of the immigrants became rattled, afraid to answer incorrectly. Ciro saw that remaining calm was half the battle to earn your papers. He took a deep breath.

The attending officer looked over his paperwork, then up at Ciro. He walked Ciro to a holding pen. Ciro began to sweat, knowing that this was a bad sign. He waved at Luigi, who had progressed only a few feet from where he started. There were at least twenty people in front of Luigi who still needed their medical exam. Luigi waved back, helpless to assist.

What if Don Gregorio had figured out the nuns’ plan and contacted U.S. immigration? Suddenly Ciro felt like the young orphan he was. There was no one to help, nowhere he could turn. If he were banished again, rejected from American soil, there was no telling where he would be sent, and he was certain Eduardo would never find him.

They were advised aboard ship to never leave the line at Ellis Island, and to try to draw as little attention to themselves as possible. Never get in an argument. Never push or shove. Keep your head down and your voice low. Agree to all conditions, and accommodate all requests. The goal at Ellis Island was to process through without incident and make it back into Manhattan as quickly as possible. Immigration had a thousand reasons to turn you away, from the rasp of a dry cough to a suspicious answer about your ultimate destination. You didn’t want to make it easy for a coldhearted processing agent in a gray coat to send you right back to Italy.

Ciro’s heart raced as the immigration officer returned with another officer to speak with him.

“Signor Lazzari?” the second officer said, in perfect Italian.

“Yes, sir.”

“Andiamo,” he said sternly.

The officer led Ciro into a small room with a table and two chairs. A poster of the United States flag hung on the windowless wall. The officer indicated that Ciro should take a seat. The officer spoke perfect Italian, though Ciro saw that the name on his jacket was American.

“Signor Lazzari,” he said.

“Signor Anderson.” Ciro nodded. “What have I done?” he said, looking down at his hands.

“I don’t know. What have you done?”

“Nothing, sir,” Ciro replied. Then, noticing the officer’s gaze on his coal-gray hands, he quickly added, “I worked in the pit on the SS Chicago on my way over.”

Signor Anderson pulled Sister Ercolina’s letter from a file folder. As he read over it, Ciro panicked. “So you know the sisters of San Nicola,” the officer said.

The poor sisters had tried to do right by Ciro, but instead, it seemed, they had attracted the attention of this wolf in the gray uniform. “I grew up in their orphanage,” Ciro admitted.

“The diocese here in New York received a telegram. You’re on our list.”

Ciro swallowed, certain the telegram was from Don Gregorio. After this long trip working in the furnace in hellish heat, all was for naught. Ciro would be plucked from the group and deported. He would end up in the work camp after all. “Where am I to be sent?” he asked quietly.

“Sent? You just got here, didn’t you? Those nuns wired the archbishop some kind of character reference. You’re to be processed as quickly as possible.” Signor Anderson made notes inside the file.

In one miraculous moment, Ciro realized that Signor Anderson wasn’t the enemy; he wasn’t going to send him back to Italy to the work camp. “Thank you, Signore,” Ciro said.

“You have to change your name.” He gave Ciro a list and said, “Choose.”

Brown

Miller

Jones

Smith

Collins

Blake

Lewis

“Take Lewis. It’s an L name like yours.”

Ciro glanced over the names and handed the list back to Mr. Anderson. “Will you send me back if I don’t change my name?”

“They won’t be able to pronounce your name here, kid.”

“Sir, if they can say spaghetti, they can pronounce Lazzari.”

Signor Anderson tried not to laugh. “Scoliaferrantella was my name,” he said. “I had no choice.”

“What province are you from, Signore?” Ciro asked.

“Roma.”

“My brother Eduardo just entered the Sant’Agostino Seminary there. He’s going to become a priest. So you see,” Ciro continued, “if I give up my name, it will die. It’s only my brother and me in the world. I don’t want to lose Lazzari.”