1944 - 3 Summary

Rome becomes a mess of bodies, beggars and filth while Reich Commands eat and drink lavishly, and orchestrate more massacres. Cruel German forces have overtaken buildings and turned them into torture chambers, employing their occupants as help. Young men are being rounded up and deported as forced labor. Young men are being required to report for Reich labor, and so much needless death is taking place that there is a certain hush among the people. New and increasingly "niggling" orders, rules and requirements are posted about the city every day, and hunger dominates the population to the point where Ida's paycheck is not enough to buy olive oil. Useppe is again losing weight and Ida is again leaving every day to find food for him, living on grass and water herself. Ida is shrunken with malnutrition but possesses an "unnamed instinct for preservation...