Kamal told her about his religion, his beliefs, the Rehat Maryada, the code of conduct that forbade Sikhs from cutting their hair or their beard, from drinking alcohol, eating meat or gambling. He told her about his god, who preached a pure and whole life, a single, creator god who was neither Christian, nor Hindu, nor of any faith, but who was ONE, that was all. Sikhs believed that all religions led to the same god, and that as such, all deserved respect. Giulia loved the idea of a faith without original sin, without heaven or hell. Heaven and hell existed only in this life, said Kamal, and it seemed to her that he was right.

The Sikh religion considers a woman to have the same soul as a man, he said. Sikhism treated both sexes alike. Women were allowed to recite hymns in the temple, to officiate at all the ceremonies, including baptisms. Women were to be respected, honoured for their role in the family and society. A Sikh must treat another man’s wife as a sister or a mother, and the daughter of another man as his own. As a symbol of that equality, Sikh names applied to both sexes alike. Only their second name distinguished them. ‘Singh’ for men, which meant ‘lion’; and ‘Kaur’ for women – a word he translated as ‘princess’.

Principessa.

Giulia loved it when Kamal called her that. She found it harder and harder to leave him and go back to work. How sweet it would be to spend whole days like this, she thought. Days, and nights, too. It seemed to her that she could spend the rest of her life making love to Kamal and listening to him talk.

And yet she knew that she had no right to be there. Kamal’s skin, and his god, were not those of the Lanfredi. Giulia knew what her mother would say: a dark-skinned man, and not even a Christian! She would be mortified. The news would be all over the neighbourhood. And so Giulia loved Kamal in secret. Their love was clandestine. With no official papers.

She returned to the workshop later and later after lunch. La Nonna was beginning to suspect something. She had seen the smile on Giulia’s face, the new sparkle in her eyes. Giulia claimed to be going to the library every day, but she would come back out of breath, her cheeks aflame. One afternoon, La Nonna even thought she could see sand in Giulia’s hair, under her headscarf. The women began to gossip: did she have a lover? Was he a boy from the neighbourhood? Was he younger than her? Older? She denied anything was going on, and her insistence was tantamount to a confession.