Ch. 20

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"Allons, Fritz, ne pleur pas!"
Francis was sitting on the train that would have taken him to Venice with Friedrich on his lap. He had just woken up, and Francis was trying to brighten his mood. It seemed to work. The little guy really liked Francis.
He had kept true to his word. He was going to give Friedrich back to his parents. But deep down he knew why he had decided to go so out of his way. He wanted to know how caring for a kid felt. And he was loving it.
Though he knew that this moment would be short - lived, he enjoyed it. He couldn't help but compare Friedrich to his own kid. He didn't even know if his child was a boy or a girl, but he had always felt that it was a boy.
As soon as he got to Venice, he went to the city hall to ask about mrs Felicia Vargas - Beilschmidt. His Italian was not good at all, but it seemed that the people of Venice spoke a fair amount of languages, like German and French, so he made it.
When he arrived at the given address he simply called. "Madame Vargas! Felicia Vargas! J'ai votre enfant ici avec moi!"
Neither Ludwig nor Feli were home. So it was Romano Vargas who leaned out of the window to see what the hell was going on. He saw a strange man that was calling his beloved granddaughter in French, so he adressed him in his language. Romano Vargas really knew an amazing amount of idioms.
"What do you want from Felicia? Who are you?"
Francis was glad to see that he would not need interpreters.
"I'm Francis de Bonnefoy, monsieur. I'm looking for Felicia and Ludwig Beilschmidt. I have their son here!"
Romano could not believe his ears. He ran down the stairs, invited the man over and offered him his finest wine and cigars. He looked at his great - grandchild in awe, and seeing how he was the spitting image of Ludwig, if it wasn't for that single curly hair that stuck out, he had no doubts that the baby was the boy he had heard so much about. Lovino was there too, and he went completely gaga over his little nephew.
Feli and Ludwig had gone grocery shopping. They were taking their time coming back, because Ludwig wanted to see where Feli went to school and played as a kid. Feli had happily shown him, telling him all of the funny things that she remembered from her childhood. The day she first went to school, the bridge where she had given her first kiss, the numerous times she had fallen in a canal when she was playing hide and seek with her friends...
Ludwig had no trouble picturing Feli as a kid, running around the city. When they were coming home, their heard a gondolier sing a very soft Italian song.

"E poi il ritorno
in un paese diviso
più nero nel viso,
più rosso d'amor..."

Feli recognized the song. Ludwig did not really catch much of it, so he asked Feli what it meant. She gave a distant smile and translated. "It's a folk song. It talks about a woman who has gone to Ethiopia to work during the rise of the fascism, and when she came back the fascists had taken over Italy, so she finds 'a divided country, more black in the face, more red with love...' you know, black is the colour of Fascism, but red is the color of partisans. Do you get it?"
Ludwig thought that he understood. There were many things about Italy he didn't really get, like the Italian downright uselessness when it came to organize something, or the way no one was ever sharp on time when they had to show up somewhere. But on the other hand, he thought, this was how they rolled. He was sure that you had to be born there to actually understand how things worked.
When they arrived home, they heard Romano and Lovino happily speaking French to an unknown guy who was holding a bundle of covers.
Romano spotted the astounded couple at the door and smiled excitedly, telling them in German "You guys won't believe this! Francis here has brought Friedrich all the way from Germany!"
Ludwig and Feli stayed motionless for a moment. Then they rushed to Francis to see if it was actually true. They didn't think they could be as happy as they were in that moment. And while they cried, hugging and kissing a very pleased, bigger and healthy Friedrich, they both thought that finally life was going the way it should.

Fin.

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