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mother was left shattered,
a glass broken but still held fractured in the frame, like the chrysanthemums
glass in their bathroom window, a view of life that could never be made whole
or clear again.
    Mary Grace didn’t want to end up a bitter woman, as she believed
her mother had been. Now she felt her mother was haunting her. She felt lost
and confused. She didn’t know what direction her life was going, and she was
tired of feeling like she didn’t belong anywhere. Was her mother’s life
dismantling her own life?

 
    The Curtain Pulls Back
    Chapter 17
     
    ARMED WITH THE translations of the letters Mary Grace went to see
Aunt Maggie. Aunt Maggie sighed. “Uncle Paul, he lived in Italy with the family
to work.”
    “What does this have to do with my mother?”
    “ Aspett , listen, you want to know? Yes?” 
    “Yes, Aunt Maggie, I want to know.”
    “Uncle Paul went to Italy, he was a careless young man, sent to
the famiglia, to Papa Maschere’s older brothers, made to work long hours
in the quarry, to d iventae un uomo, tobecome a man . He had grown strong, and he had found love. He had met the
beauti ful Caterina.”
    Mary Grace remembered Uncle Paul’s sketches.
    “They were come per la magia insieme , this is like magic,
special together. Uncle Paul, though, he had to return to America because of
the war. It was coming and he had to get out. Everyone thought that by
returning he’d be able to later bring Caterina to him. Capisci? He had
to leave Caterina there.”
    “Okay.” Mary Grace noticed Aunt Maggie was
shak ing.
    “When he could, he would come back for Caterina, but during the
war she had gone with her family and met a bad end.”
    “What do you mean, Aunt Maggie?”
    “Ah, for such a smart girl you know nothing. Their family, her
parents, Caterina and a younger brother all were killed in an accident fleeing
the bombings.” Mary Grace saw the pain in Aunt Maggie’s face about these people
she didn’t even know, but she knew that they meant so much to Uncle Paul. They
sat quiet for a while. 
    Mary Grace saw Aunt Maggie’s eyes were full of
sad ness
for Uncle Paul. But, still, what did this have to do with her mother?
    Aunt Maggie continued, “Giuseppe, your mother’s brother also worked at the quarry. He and your Un cle
Paul had become friends. Uncle Paul had to come back here. Giuseppe kept
connected with our Maschere family in Ravello, a small town above Amalfi, which
is where Papa came from.”
    Uncle Paul and Giuseppe Giordano? Mary Grace tried
to absorb this new information. She could remember that there were times that
Uncle Paul disappeared for a while.
    Now she realized her mother knew where Uncle Paul had gone on
these trips and that he had known all about her. Somehow, he was a threat to
Teresa. It wasn’t these letters from cugina Rosalie; it was Uncle Paul
who connected the families? It was so much to think about.
    Plus, Mary Grace was still trying to absorb
that Uncle Paul had had his own life, and a now this con firmed love and
loss in Italy.
    The next time Mary Grace went to see Aunt Maggie she brought one
of the sketchbooks from the attic, but Aunt Maggie pushed it away.
    “Your mother, Teresa, came here because she was no happy in Italy.
That is her family story. Find the letters from your mother’s sister.”
    “What? What letters? Other letters? Aunt Maggie, what are you
talking about?”
    “Teresa lived in Boston with cugini when she came, and
thought she would be a big fashion designer, but she was seamstress in the
factory.
    “She was at a wedding that your father and Uncle Paul go to
because Giuseppe set up that they be invited. I always thought Giuseppe wanted
Uncle Paul to like your mother, but instead it was your father that felt she
was a tesoro (treasure) and he wanted only to marry her.
    “She wanted romance, love letters, fancy, fancy.
    “Your father he was a simple hard-working man, a good family man.
So, now you know about the letters. She married