two men on the street if they knew whether the Ghetto had come up with the gold. Neither had any idea what she was talking about.
She spotted a little old man walking, wearing a dark suit and a capellino, a skullcap. She caught up with him, touching his elbow. “Excuse me, sir, may I ask you question?”
“Of course, young lady.”
“Do you know if the Ghetto was able to come up with the gold?”
“Yes,” he answered, a smile creasing his lined face. “We did.”
“Thank God!” Elisabetta threw her arms around him.
He didn’t seem to mind.
CHAPTER EIGHTY-NINE
Sandro
29 September 1943
Tonight was the eve of Rosh Hashanah, and Sandro and his father were in the synagogue early in the morning, putting the Sala di Consiglio back in order with the secretary, Rosina. Sandro felt happy and proud that the Ghetto Jews had survived their ordeal. He had never admired his father more, having seen him rise to the challenge.
Suddenly the grinding of heavy engines came from the piazza. Sandro exchanged glances with his father, and Rosina’s eyes flared in alarm. The three of them hurried to the window and looked outside in horror.
Panzer tanks with long tank guns were driving to the very doors of the synagogue. Behind them were Kubelwagens full of Nazis and two large covered trucks.
Rosina emitted a frightened cry.
“Oh no!” Sandro felt a bolt of terror.
“What are they doing?” his father asked, clutching the windowsill.
They watched as Nazis in Wehrmacht uniforms jumped out of the vehicles, unloaded sawhorses from the truck, and cordoned off the piazza. A black sedan with Nazi flags pulled up, and a Gestapo captain emerged from its back seat, with a plainly nervous President Foà. Families in the piazza began to gather behind the cordon.
“Let’s go.” His father led the way, and they hurried downstairs, reached the ground floor, and met Foà and the Gestapo officer as they entered the synagogue.
Foà gestured to the Nazi, tense. “This is Captain Mayer of the SS. Captain Mayer, allow me to introduce—”
“I have no time for chitchat,” Mayer interrupted him, unsmiling. “We need to search the synagogue for radio equipment. We believe that you Jews have been in secret contact with the Badoglio government.”
Foà added, “Captain Mayer’s men searched my house this morning, looking for such evidence. Of course, he found none. I assured him that none of us has any such contacts.”
“Of course not.” Sandro’s father turned to Mayer. “There is no reason to search the synagogue. This is a place of worship. There is no radio equipment here or anything of the sort. This is outrageous.”
Sandro bit his tongue, frightened for his father. Nazi soldiers armed with submachine guns were already pouring through the door, positioning themselves behind Mayer in a show of lethal force.
“Stand aside,” Mayer said to them, then barked an order in German. The Nazi soldiers aimed their guns at Sandro, his father, and Rosina.
His father straightened. “Captain Mayer, you need not threaten us in this way. I merely sought to explain—”
“Move aside!”
They did so, and Mayer issued another order, causing the Nazi soldiers to lower their weapons. On the next command, the Nazis flooded the sanctuary, jogged down the aisles in their black boots, and rifled through the carved wooden seats. There were locked wooden boxes at each seat that contained prayer books, and they smashed the lids with the butts of their guns.
Sandro and the others watched, terrified and aghast. One cadre of Nazis hustled to the alms boxes, also locked, and broke them open the same way. Yet another cadre hurried to the front of the synagogue, climbed the steps to the bimah, and headed for the ark, which held the sacred Torah scrolls and other holy books, behind a brocade curtain.
Sandro clutched his father’s arm, and they stood in stunned disbelief as the Nazis yanked the curtain aside, exposing the holy books. They picked up two scrolls and threw them on the floor, a profanity.
Sandro’s father gasped. “Captain Mayer, that’s vandalism! Those soldiers are in a sacred area, where only rabbis are permitted. There is no radio equipment!”
Foà’s eyes rounded with alarm. “Captain Mayer, you can’t do this! This is a violation of Jewish law, and I cannot sanction—”
“Silence!” Mayer shouted. “I have orders to search the synagogue from top to bottom. You lost the war and are now under martial law. Quiet or I’ll have you taken to Via Tasso.”
Sandro’s heart hammered in his chest, and he looked over, horrified to see Nazis swarming the stairwell, running upstairs