Weak from Dysentery and Malaria, the eyes of the trio adjust to the sullen beauty of San Dona di Piave – a tree lined boulevard bathed in fluorescent light and a small contingent of German soldiers guarding a bridge.
“Our only hope of survival is to split up” warns Bill. The three New Zealanders shake hands.
Cobblestones resonate with the sound of hooves – a wagon driven by a young Italian farmer pulls to a stop. The young man motions to Bill to hide beneath a pile of sacks. Crossing the flat Lombardy plains, the sound of German voices penetrates the mist – hard, like the dentist’s drill.
Food is an invisible mystery – the countryside is a mosaic of ancient ploughs, stubbles of corn and tired looking donkeys. An old man carries his weight in firewood.
A terracotta church, red the colour of baked earth stands alone. Bill furiously pounds on the door of the Catholic Church in Santa Maria Cessalto. A Priest opens the door – a raven dressed in traditional black. Don Pietro Buogo is slightly built with a round face and even sharper nose. Bill notices he has a limp. The church is awash with the musty smell of hymn books and the sweet fragrance of flowers.
In the noon heat, a gust of air smelling of garlic floats from the kitchen. After lunch Don Pietro arranges a safe house for Bill with the Varaschin family.
The Germans offer huge rewards for the capture of escaped prisoners of war. The rules are clear - anyone caught assisting the Allies will be executed or sent to work camps.
Months later, Riccardo Varaschin, Bill and three other New Zealanders sit in the farmyard kitchen – cards are tabled alongside glasses of strong red wine and falling tendrils of falling ash. The men are surrounded by the smell of a wood burning stove and freshly baked bread. A hand hammers at the door. The crash of loud voices fills the evening air. Smiles slip from faces the colour of corpses. Sweat runs down the side of Bill's cheek. Betrayed by the Fascists the men are taken to the local prison.
Days before Riccardo is to be deported to a labour camp in Germany, the Allies bomb the prison and by some strange twist of fate, an unharmed Riccardo walks home to his family in Ceggia.
Bill and his compatriots are herded onto a train bound for Germany. Bill has hidden a knife in his shoe. Rivalling the exploits of Harrison Ford the men lift wooden floorboards one by one and lower themselves from the moving train onto the tracks. Adrenaline surges through his veins as Bill takes to his heels.
Hiding in trenches and deserted barns Bill has no option but to return to the familiar landscape of rural Lombardy. Helped by Don Pietro he lives with the Zanatta family for 18 months.
By 1943 spies are in every village - locals desperate for food betray many POW’s. When the bodies of three soldiers killed by the partisans are discovered in Ceggia, Don Pietro organises their burial and swears the village to secrecy.
A meeting is held. Don Pietro arranges for Bill to seek refuge with partisans hiding in the snow covered Dolomite Mountains. Years later, Bill laughs as he recalls leaving Ceggia – “I made my get-away on a bicycle. What an exit!”
Bill travels from one safe house to another until he joins the brigade of Nino Nanetti and Allied Special Forces. High in the mountains at Belluno, life is a matter of survival. Food is desperately short, the terrain hazardous, sub-zero temperatures and atrocious blizzards kill many of the men.
Snow and ice hides Bill from the enemy. In the pristine white Dolomites, he finds a home in a cave, an abandoned hut or a barn. He remains in Italy until the war ends.
