As he watched them go, and the people gathered around to shake his hand and pat him on the back, Giancarlo found the tears once again welling up in his eyes, but this time they were not tears of sadness. Something inside him had changed, like he had been freed from a great weight that had been holding him down all these years. Suddenly he felt lighter than air, and for the first time since he could remember, Giancarlo Rosa felt truly happy.

EPILOGUE

EPILOGUE

Giancarlo and Carter stayed two more days in Castelalto. By then the doctors were certain that Giorgio would recover from his injuries. He would be in the hospital for quite a while, but in time he would mend.

The day they were to leave, Carter came downstairs with his duffel bag in tow and lugged it out to the piazza, where a car was waiting to take them to Rome.The driver, who introduced himself as Giacomo, took the bag from him and stowed it in the trunk next to Giancarlo’s suitcase. Carter looked around. It was nearly time to go, but his teacher was nowhere to be seen.

“Don’t worry. He’ll be here soon,” said Antonella, who was waiting over by the fountain.

“Where is he?” asked Carter.

Gesturing for him to follow, Antonella walked to the edge of the piazza and pointed down below, to the village cemetery.There Carter saw Giancarlo kneeling before a gravestone.

“He went to mass this morning,” she said softly. “Now he’s saying goodbye to his mother and father.”

Giancarlo walked out of the cemetery and returned to the piazza a few minutes later. Though his eyes were red-rimmed and swollen, he walked with his head held high, and he looked very much to Carter like a man who had finally found peace.

For his part, Giancarlo truly did feel as though the world had finally been set right again. This strange, unexpected trip, the end really of the one he began thirty years ago, had led him through the darkest chambers of his heart, but along the way he had learned at last how to throw open the shutters and let the light back in.

By now, many of the villagers had turned out to see Giancarlo and Carter off. They all bid their farewells, before retreating a discreet distance to let Antonella say goodbye to them by herself.

Antonella looked at the two men and pressed her hands together in a gesture of gratitude, before opening her arms wide.

“What can I say to the men who rescued my husband?” she said with a smile.

With that she came up first to Carter, gave him a warm embrace, and brushed her cheek against his.

“Ciao, Carter,” she said. “Remember, you are always welcome here, so come back again anytime you want.”

“I will,” promised Carter with a mischievous smile, “but next time I’m definitely going to want a cone of gelato.”