the course of several days before going home to the apartment Enza had prepared for her.
Enza fell into the familiar routine of a new baby in the house. She set up the layette, made sure that Luigi had regular meals, kept up with the laundry, bathed and washed Pappina’s hair, and made sure everything in the apartment was tidy. She made a large pot of soup, with tomatoes, root vegetables, orzo, and broth, that would help Pappina regain her strength. Enza felt a rush of giddiness, imagining that Pappina would do the same for her someday.
Enza took the trolley home to Chisholm after five days at Pappina’s side. She smiled as she looked out the window, remembering that nothing made a woman more bone-tired than looking after a baby.
She pushed the shop door open and smiled. Ciro looked up and placed his lathe on the table. “How is young John Latini?”
“Almost ten pounds, and I have the sore neck to prove it.” Enza laughed.
“A Valentine’s Day baby.” Ciro beamed.
“You should take the trolley over to see them.” Enza turned to go upstairs, then remembered she had a message to deliver, “Luigi said to tell you that the baby had a small nose. He said you would understand.”
“Va bene,” Ciro said, bursting into laughter at the private joke.
“He’s a healthy boy, small nose or not,” Enza assured him.
“All that milk she drank was worth it.”
“We’d better buy a cow,” Enza said.
“Where would we put a cow? That patch of ground in the back will yield some tomatoes, and that’s about it.”
“It could be a small cow,” Enza said softly, placing her hands on her hips and then the small of her back.
“Are you—” Ciro looked Enza up and down, in search of the lush fullness a woman carrying a baby would most certainly possess. She was as beautiful as ever; only her hand on her waist indicated a change.
Enza nodded that she was expecting a baby.
A honeymoon baby.
Their wedding-night baby.
Somewhere between Paoli, Pennsylvania, and Crestline, Ohio, on the path of the Broadway Limited to Chicago, Enza had conceived their child. Ciro went to her, lifted her up off the ground, and held her tight. “I thought I couldn’t be any happier.”
Ciro felt a joy within his heart that he could not describe, filling him up in a way he had never thought possible. It was instant, and would last for the rest of his life.
A baby of their own was his highest dream. Ciro remembered imagining his wife and children before he met them, and the house he would build in Vilminore for them. But all those dreams were beside the point, now that it was really happening. He had so much love for his wife and the baby within her that he felt a new fire within him, stoking a greater ambition to provide for them. All he hoped for in this moment was many children, and a long life to take care of them.
Chapter 24
A TRAIN TICKET
Un Biglietto per il Treno
The Minnesota summer was as glorious as any Enza remembered as a girl in the Italian Alps. Longyear Lake dazzled like a sapphire, reflecting the cloudless sky that was saturated in deepest blue, like Marrakesh silk. The evergreen trees fringed the horizon, while low green thickets were speckled with the first buds of sweet blackberries. The loons wailed in the morning light, calling across the water.
Enza propped open every skylight in the house. In the final weeks of her pregnancy, she had nested with a vengeance; she had washed every window, scrubbed the floors, and perfected the details of the nursery. She had sewn a layette for the baby in snow white chamois and soft cotton. She trimmed the bunting in white grosgrain ribbon, and piped the hood in silk. Ciro had built a crib and painted it white. He stenciled the walls of the nursery in alternating stripes of cream and sandy beige, to give the effect of wallpaper—a trick Enza had learned watching Neil Mazzella as he directed the scenery load-ins at the Metropolitan Opera.
When the bells on the shop door jingled that morning, Ciro had looked up from his work. He was so surprised, he dropped his shears onto the table with a thud.
Laura Heery stood in the doorway, a suitcase in one hand and a hatbox in the other. She wore a navy crepe suit, a matching straw hat, and white gloves. “I couldn’t very well let your girl have a baby without me.” She