José turned to me. “I decided to teach the children how to make pasta.”

“Pasa! Pasa!” Teresita giggled, waving her pudgy arms in the air before shoving the wad of pasta dough she gripped into her mouth.

“Don’t worry. I will clean it up,” José said, turning back to his work at the table.

I looked around our small kitchen. “José, this is all of our provisions. We don’t have the money or rations to replace this.”

“Don’t worry about it, tesoro mio,” he said, giving me a floury kiss.

“Don’t worry? How am I supposed to feed us tomorrow? Or the day after that?” I crossed my arms, clenching my fists. I couldn’t believe how foolish José was being.

“I have it taken care of.”

“Menotti, take your sister outside. Mamãe and Papai need to have a conversation,” I said as sweetly as possible.

“But Mamãe, we are making spaghetti.” Menotti threw his pasta on the table.

“Right now, young man.” I pointed to the door. “And dust some of that flour off your and your sister’s clothes.”

Menotti looked up at his father. “Go ahead, your mother and I have to talk. We’ll finish after you have come back in,” José said.

Reluctantly Menotti jumped off the chair he’d been standing on. I watched as he took his sister by the hand, then I turned back to José. He had his back to me, working on the pasta as if there weren’t a problem. “Talk to me. Why are you behaving like a madman?”

He sighed, dropping excess dough into a bowl. “The French and English broke up the army.”

“How? How can they do such a thing? They are foreign countries. They can’t come here and do whatever they like.”

“They can and they are,” he said, not looking up at me as he kneaded the dough. “They aren’t stopping with the army. They are breaking up the whole government. Tearing it down and starting from scratch.”

I huffed. “I’m sure they will be putting together one that favors them.”

José grunted in response. He still refused to face me. Instead, he played with the pasta on the table, rolling it into a long noodle.

“What does this mean for the Redshirts? What about us?”

“My men are in purgatory. They have yet to get any pay.” He slammed a ball of dough onto the table. “As always, the English and French have no idea what they are doing.” He took in a deep breath, regaining control of himself. “I’m getting my pardon. The king of Piedmont is calling all Italians living abroad home.”

“Oh, José, that is wonderful news.” I reached out and pulled him by the arm, forcing him to look at me.

“Don’t forget, he’s only the king of Piedmont. Not a unified Italy. If I go back, there is no guarantee that I will be safe anywhere outside of his realm.”

“But it’s a start, isn’t it? And tell me, José, when have we actually been safe?”