She would not think of Zwerger. She would remember, instead, one of her last evenings with Nico. It had been a week or so before the attack on Monte Grappa had started, and they’d all squeezed around the kitchen table after dinner. The electricity had fizzled out at dusk, but they’d lighted enough lamps to brighten the room, and Nico had read from the Divine Comedy, and the poetry had been so beautiful. So lovely, and made lovelier still by his narration. They had all been so happy. Before she could stop herself the words slipped from her mouth.

“‘The soul unto its star returns,’” she said, remembering.

“What? That doesn’t mean anything.”

“It does, but a man like you wouldn’t recognize it.”

“Shut up—”

She would not shut up, for she had found her voice again, and with it her courage. She would not be quiet. “You are caught up in a nightmare of your own making, and the evil you do will bury you, as it is sure to bury every man who stands at your side. The poet knew that, but do you?”

“I don’t need to listen to some corrupt Jew text—”

“It was from the Divine Comedy. The fourth canto of Paradiso. But what would a man like you know of Dante?”

Zwerger overturned the table and dragged her from the chair. He shoved her against the wall, his hands encircling her throat, and his breath was so rancid against her face she wanted to vomit. Yet still she found her voice.

“What more can you take from me? You murdered the man I love, my baby, and my parents. They’re gone, and with them any power you have over me. You have made martyrs of us all—can you not see it? History will remember men like Niccolò and my father, but darkness is all that awaits you and your kind.”

His hands tightened around her throat, choking the life from her, and it was almost amusing, in that moment, to see how enraged he had become. She had maddened him and there was nothing he could do to stop her. What was death in the face of such truths?

She heard, dimly, the crash of the door. Advancing footsteps. Zwerger’s hands were wrenched from her neck. She fell to the floor, her throat on fire, but no one came to help her.

“Zuerst der Partisan, dann die Jüdin? Wann lernst du es endlich?” First that partisan and now this Jew. When will you learn?

“Sie hat mich provoziert—” She provoked me—

“Schick sie nach Norden. Läßt jemand anderen deine Probleme wegräumen. Das ist ein Befehl!” Send her north. Have someone else clean up your mess. That’s an order!

Retreating footsteps. A muttered curse. A boot prodding her side.