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With liberation, Arsolians trustfully hoped for better times. Local Communist Boss Fabio Alimonti went to Rome. Dressed in his best shiny black suit, he faced Rome's prefect. Said he: "You take our water for your benefit and spill what you don't need. The people of Arsoli cannot be left to die. Find a pump to bring life back to our hills."
When the prefect remarked that Alimonti used language far above his station, that his was no peasant's talk, Alimonti replied: "I could throttle my mother for having given birth to a clever son. I wish I were like other Arsolians who are ready to go down before your force. I cannot. I see things as they are. My fire won't let me sleep nor eat nor laugh till I see justice done." When Alimonti returned to Arsoli he believed that he had won his point. To the peasants crowding round him in the shadow of the castle, which overhangs the whole of Arsoli, he quietly announced that he thought something would be done.
After months went by and nothing happened, angry Alimonti sat down at his rough desk. In fine handwriting for which, too, he curses his mother, he wrote a letter to the highest authority, the republic's then President Enrico de Nicola: "Now that we have a republic and that the people reign . . .", and he explained Arsoli's case: "Please see that something is done for this starving population." Punctilious, prompt and useless was De Nicola's reply. It ran: "Your request has been passed on to competent Roman municipal authorities." That was the end of that.
Water That Christ Sent. Arsolians put two & two together. Said they: "Rome's mayor is a Demo-Christian—naturally he won't listen to a Communist. What we must do is vote Demo-Christian. Will Christians deny us water that Christ sent to us in the first place?"
So they voted Demo-Christian last spring. When the electoral results became known, local Demo-Christians told them of the government's financial difficulties and the need for patience, so the people of Arsoli modified their request. Instead of begging for a pump which would cost 12 million lire (about $21,000), they declared themselves ready to wait, so as not to throw an excessive financial burden on the government.
But because of pressing unemployment they wrote: "We would humbly point out that there is no road between Arsoli and Cervara [a nearby town]. The path is so narrow that a mule can hardly get through. While you take your time to solve the urgent question of our water, please advance funds to build a road and employ our idle young men. We respectfully submit that these young men have nothing to put in their kitchen pots, and their parents are pained to see them grow up as wastrels." Back came Rome's answer: "Start work at once. The government will send money."