at her friend distractedly. ‘Just a moment.’ She handed the bellboy a few coins, folded the paper and put it into her handbag.
Isabella was placed next to Peter at lunch. The young officer turned out to be everything the Princess had promised – charming, amusing, kind – and with a good command of Italian.
The lunch, attended by several of the Princess’s friends, was a gossipy affair. The guests joked and entertained one another with witty stories, but Isabella could think of little else but Pietro Koch’s trial.
‘You seem rather lost in thought,’ Peter said quietly.
‘Oh, I’m sorry,’ she replied, ‘you must think me very rude. I’ve just had a bit of a shock. A newspaper story that took me back… to the war, you know?’
‘The Princess mentioned you’d had a rather difficult time.’
‘Yes,’ she replied wearily, ‘you could say that.’
‘Do you want to talk about it?’ he asked sympathetically.
‘I don’t think so.’ She smiled at him bravely. ‘It’s a rather long story.’
‘I understand – perhaps another time. I gather you’re a keen golfer,’ he said, diplomatically changing the subject.
‘Oh, yes, I like the odd round. I’m a member of the Acquasanta. Do you know it?’
‘I certainly do! It’s considered to be the most beautiful course in Europe. It was laid out by a British groundsman – did you know that?’
‘Yes,’ she said, smiling, ‘I think I did know that.’
‘Entire bombing raids were designed around preserving it. “We can’t bomb the Acquasanta,” said the Generals. “We might want a game after the war.”’ He laughed.
‘Well I have to confess I didn’t quite realise its significance,’ she replied, ‘but thank God for the British upper classes’ love of golf.’ She laughed a little herself. It was the first time in months, and it felt good. ‘You’ll be pleased to know,’ she went on, ‘that it’s just as beautiful today as it was before the war. I’ll take you there if you like.’
‘That’s a date,’ he said, covering her hand with his. His skin felt cool and smooth. His touch was kind and gentle. She looked into his green eyes, admiring his sandy hair, and smiled.
The lunch over, they said a polite goodbye in the lobby.
‘May I call you?’ he asked.
The Princess, hovering in the background, winked irritatingly at her.
‘Yes,’ she replied. ‘I’d like that.’
But as she hurried home across the park, she forgot the handsome Englishman. Her mind was racing back to the time when she had found herself in an agonising triangle between Vicenzo and Koch.
Back home, she closeted herself in her bedroom, took out the newspaper, laid it on the bed and began to read:
Pietro Koch, the notorious Fascist police chief, was found guilty yesterday of ‘aiding the enemy during the Nazi occupation of Rome, and the torture and death of Italian patriots’.
Isabella read on, mesmerised, as the details of Koch’s crimes were laid bare.
Appearing in Rome’s High Court, Pietro Koch was found guilty of the beating and torture of hundreds of prisoners, and the illegal invasion of Rome’s Vatican City, in order to arrest anti-Fascist leaders. He was also accused and found guilty of supplying the Germans with a list of hostages who were later massacred in the Ardeatine Caves.
Throughout his twenty-minute court appearance, the defendant sat bolt upright in the dock, his neck shaved like a German, his eyes bloodshot.
Isabella could picture him – the neat moustache, the pressed blue suit.
As the charges were laid out and the prosecution witnesses detailed his crimes, Koch looked around at the court with a condescending sneer. He appeared fearless and defiant throughout.
Just three witnesses had been called – the two for the prosecution were both ex-police chiefs who gave detailed accounts of his crimes. But it was the name of the defence witness which made Isabella sit up in shock.
Appearing as the only witness for the defence was Count Vicenzo Lucchese, who, in addition to being a well-known film director, was also a leading member of Rome’s Resistance movement. Although he was imprisoned by the defendant for many weeks between April and June 1944, Koch’s defence hinged on his claim to have secured Count Lucchese’s release.
‘Koch ordered me to be shot one night,’ Count Lucchese told the court. ‘I was kept in “the hole” – a basement room in Pensione Jaccarino – without food for several days. Finally, they moved me; I understand they needed the space for a couple, a man and a woman, who I later was told were hung up from a hook in the ceiling by their