From Sand and Ash(42)

That night, he fell into bed after hasty prayers, his leg aching, feeling wearier than he’d ever felt, but his mind kept returning to Eva. She’d watched him leave the chapel without protest, her face blank, gripping her violin like it was all she cared about in the world, and he’d walked away without looking back. He’d had to. She was safe and he was needed elsewhere. But it reminded him too much of August of 1939 when he’d walked away and left her in the Pazzi Chapel.

They’d come back from Maremma, back to reality, with a new knowledge of each other and of the world they found themselves in. Angelo had known what he had to do, and he’d done it. But the memory haunted him still.



On September 26, less than ten days after Eva moved in with the sisters at Santa Cecilia, Lieutenant Colonel Kappler, the head of the German SS in Rome, demanded fifty kilograms of gold be delivered to German headquarters on Via Tasso. If the Jewish community failed to do so within thirty-six hours, two hundred of Rome’s Jews would be rounded up and deported.

Lines of Jews formed outside the main synagogue on Lungotevere de’ Cenci, desperate people donating all they had to keep the dragon at bay. Angelo forbade Eva from going anywhere near the synagogue, but she ignored him, taking every piece of gold jewelry she’d brought to Rome and waiting in line to add her offering to the pile. Uncle Augusto was among the elders assisting with the weighing and the counting, and when he saw Eva, he reassured her once more that the extortion was a “good sign.”

“The Germans are logical men. Taking our gold makes much more sense than taking our people,” he said. Eva could only shake her head. Nothing about the Jewish persecution was logical or rational. But she gave her gold with a glimmer of hope that it was exactly as her uncle said.

Eva was leaving the synagogue when she saw Mario and Giulia Sonnino standing in line with their two children. Giulia was so hugely pregnant that Eva convinced those waiting in front of her in the line to let her move ahead, so she wouldn’t have to stand for hours. The Sonninos donated their wedding rings and a Swiss pocket watch that had been in Mario’s family for three generations. Giulia joked that the thin white line on her finger was proof enough that she wasn’t a loose woman, but there were tears in her eyes when she left her thick gold band on the pile. Eva waited with their children until they were finished and walked with them back to their ghetto apartment, merely a block from the huge synagogue.

“We need pictures, and they need to be official quality,” Eva murmured. Mario nodded once, understanding immediately what she was referring to.

“We will get them to the printer. He will add them to the passes so he can stamp the picture when he stamps the pass. It makes it more complicated. But it is the only way to keep them authentic. We can add your fingerprints and signatures when we have the passes, but we need the pictures as soon as possible.”

Angelo was being impossibly close-lipped about his maneuverings, refusing Eva’s help at every turn. He was determined to keep her tucked in the convent and out of harm’s way, but she was slowly going crazy. She knew the Sonninos were on the bottom of a very long list of those in need of false identity cards, so she decided to make them her responsibility.

“I have them,” Mario said softly. “And I have pictures for ten other people in the community who will need passes as well.” He looked at her apologetically. “I don’t mean to take advantage. But these people have nowhere else to turn.”

Eva left Mario and Giulia’s apartment with the twelve pictures tucked into her brassiere and a promise to be back with the passes as soon as she could arrange for their completion. She simply had to get past Angelo and get back to Florence to see Aldo. She would buy a round-trip ticket, work all night, and return to Rome the next day. If Angelo would let her, she would deliver pictures and obtain more passes for his refugees as well.

She found him at the synagogue, standing in line with several other priests from parishes across the city. Angelo had managed to gather a significant amount of gold from non-Jewish Romans who wanted to contribute but thought they might be turned away by the “rich Jews.” Old stereotypes persisted, apparently.

No one was turned away. The average contribution was an eighth of an ounce, and the fear of failure was palpable. The lieutenant major of the SS “graciously” extended the deadline by four hours and then four hours more. Then rumors started to circulate that the Pope would step in and donate Catholic gold if the Jews failed to gather the required amount. Uncle Augusto relayed the rumor to Angelo, grinning like a Cheshire cat. “What did I tell you, Padre? We have nothing to worry about in the shadow of the Vatican.”

Miraculously, the number was reached without a donation from the Vatican, and more than one hundred and ten pounds—fifty kilograms—of gold, consisting of every last precious thing sacrificed by an already impoverished people, was delivered to German headquarters before the deadline on September 28. The Jews of Rome congratulated themselves, Augusto opened a bottle of wine, and a collective sigh of relief echoed down the cobblestone streets.

But the very next day, trucks pulled up in front of the synagogue and emptied out the rabbinical library—every book, every sacred scroll, and every precious document. Then they cleared out all the offices, carrying out filing cabinets full of records, contributor lists, and community members. Jewish leaders watched helplessly as every last piece of paper was confiscated by the very Germans who had promised to leave them alone only the day before.