“They will take me, too, when they find out I am Jewish?”

“Don’t worry, my darling. I will protect you,” I said. “This will all be over soon, I promise. Until then, you must be brave.”

There was a crowd waiting at the vaporetto dock, which was good news. It meant a boat might be coming soon. And sure enough, it arrived. It was horribly overcrowded, but they let us all squeeze aboard. I found a corner and pushed Hanni into it, hidden behind me, until we reached the San Marco stop. Then we went home without incident.

CHAPTER 44

CHAPTER 44

Juliet, Venice, September 1943

That evening I tucked Hanni into my bed. I sat beside her, stroking her hair as her eyes closed, trying not to think about how close she had come to being taken to that awful camp. And what about my dear contessa? Surely she could pull strings in the right places to be released. She was, after all, a rich and powerful woman, a benefactor of the city.

It was as if Hanni could read my thoughts. Her eyes opened and she looked up at me. “She will be all right, won’t she? They’ll let her go?”

“I’m sure she will, darling. Don’t worry. Get some sleep.”

She drifted off, but I sat up, staring out of the windows at the moon over the Giudecca Canal. Such a beautiful, peaceful scene, until I spotted a German gunboat. I couldn’t use the radio. Hanni would see, and I couldn’t risk her being questioned. So I watched until it disappeared into the darkness. I found it hard to believe that the contessa was gone. She had felt herself to be so safe, and yet they had come for her, just like all the other Jews. It hadn’t mattered that she was the wife of an Italian count or that she was very rich. She was Jewish. That was all that mattered.

And then suddenly I thought, Someone must have betrayed her. And I knew instantly who it was. I had seen the gleam of greed and acquisition in his eyes. He had betrayed her and would now help himself to her art. I realized now why I had never liked him, never trusted him. I also realized what a narrow escape Hanni had had. He wanted all Jews locked up. He had come back for her!

I had looked around cautiously when I returned home, making Hanni wait in the shadows across the street until I was sure nobody was watching. Then I whisked her inside and hurried her up the stairs. While she admired the view from my windows, I took out the drawings I had smuggled out of the contessa’s villa. Even my amateurish eye saw that one or two were indeed priceless. I slipped them amongst my own sketches, putting them into the secret drawer in my desk, just in case.