Chapter Seven

Now, Dear Reader, we must return to the Villa Fatiscente. It is early evening; the sun has nearly completed its slow journey across the sky. The heat of the day is fading in to the cool of the night. The food has been eaten, wine has been drunk. The family have broken bread with their friends. Most of the mourners have left; the farm is quiet once more. Those that remain are close family, the women fuss in the kitchen and moan about the men. The men sit out in the yard, putting the world to right. They are gathered around one end of a long wooden table. Plans need to discussed, choices and options put forward, decisions must be made.
As they talk, loudly and animatedly, they drink homemade red wine from large raffia wrapped demijohns, they eat homemade bread, cheeses, dried and cured meats, pickles and olives. They argue and laugh, they eat and drink; they are a family. Let us join them.
Adolfo sat back down at the head of the table. He placed the demijohn on the table, pulled the stopper out and poured himself another glass of wine, “Don’t worry about the tractor, there’s a good few years in it yet.”
Lorenzo lent forward and pulled the large, raffia wrapped jug towards him, “You say that now, what will you do if it breaks down again?”
“Dino knows enough to fix most problems.” The men all turned as one and looked at Dino, who was seated towards the opposite end of the table, writing in a small note book.
He Looked up and put his pen down, the sudden silence had caught his attention, “What?”
Tommaso took a swig of his wine, “Your father says you can fix the tractor.”
“Why, what’s wrong with it?”
“Nothing is wrong with it, at the moment, if it broke down, do you think you could fix it?”
“Yes, I mean… yes of course I could; if I had to.”
Adolfo took his knife and cut off a chunk of the hard, creamy white pecorino, “There, that’s settled then,” he popped a piece of the cheese in to mouth, “You see, we’ll cope.”
“We know you’ll cope,” said Lorenzo, “but that doesn’t stop me worrying about my elder brother.” He reached across and touched Adolfo’s hand.
“There’s still a good few years in me.”
Ricardo, the youngest of the brothers around the table, smiled at his elder half brother, “Are you going to let Dino fix you as well?”
The men around the table laughed as one, as only men who have spent much time together can. As only a family can. They sat in silence for a moment, there was no need to fill the gap, with family there are no uncomfortable silences.
Lorenzo poured himself some more wine and topped up Adolfo’s glass, he looked across to Tommaso and Ricardo, “Have you spoken to Arrigo?”
Tommaso, carefully peeling the skin off a piece of dried sausage, said, “He rang me from Australia this morning; he sends his love and condolences.” He cut a thin slice off the sausage and placed it carefully on a piece of bread, “He says he’s sorry he can’t be here, but that he and Rosetta are going to go to Mass tomorrow morning, they’ve asked for a special prayer.”
“That’s nice, did you see the flowers he sent. Lovely, very tasteful, I bet Rosetta chose them.” Lorenzo laughed at his own joke and took another swallow of wine.
Giacomo appeared from the house and walked over to join the group, he placed a tall, thin bottle of clear yellowy green liquid, on the table in front of Adolfo, “Mama thought you might want this.” It was Sortilegio, the famous, locally produced, liqueur.
“Why would I want that mass produced crap when we have this.” Adolfo reached under the table and produced a dusty wine bottle filled with a clear liquid.
The men around the table cheered and banged their glasses, knives, fists and any other object close to hand, on the table in a round of noisy applause.
Adolfo motioned for them to quieten down, “Do you want the women folk out here?” As one the men fell silent and looked over at the main entrance to the house, “Pass me those plastic cups, this is one of the last bottles me and Rodolfo made together, it’s nearly a year old.”
He poured a little of the clear thick liquid in to each of the plastic cups and passed them round. He stood up and looked at his brothers and sons seated before him, “A toast, to a fine son, brother, husband, father and man, Rodolfo.” The five men seated before him stood, raised their cups and chorused as one, “Rodolfo.” They each knocked back the grappa in one and stood for a moment as the thick, fiery liquid burnt its way down their throats.
Ricardo coughed and said, “Good god Adolfo, if the tractor does break down at least you’ll have something to clean the pistons with.”
Laughing, the men sat back down and once again set about the food laid before them. Lorenzo started to carve thin slices of the home cured Bresaola and pass them around, “What did the doctor say?”
“About Monica?” Said Adolfo, not looking up from the jar of pickled wild asparagus he was struggling to open.
“Yes.”
“The usual,” He passed the jar in to Ricardo’s out stretched hand, “time will heal, she needs to rest, make sure she eats, then he gives her another handful of sedatives and goes home.”
“He’s not a patch on his father.”
“Or his grandfather,” Adolfo took the now open jar from Ricardo and began to fork pickled asparagus onto a chunk of bread, “His grandfather rode on his motorbike, through that storm, the night Rodolfo was born.”
“I can’t see that new one doing that, he gets upset if your illness clashes with his golf.”
“No one cares nowadays. It always seems too much trouble for them.”
“What about that Priest,” said Ricardo, taking the jar from Adolfo, “He seemed a bit odd.”
“Well what do you expect,” said Lorenzo, winking at Tommaso, “He’s from your neck of the woods.”
“My neck of the woods?” said Ricardo, chopping at a large loaf of bread.
“Yes, he’s an Englishman like you.”
The men around the table roared with laughter. Ricardo did his best hurt look, “Very funny… very funny… you old bastard…”
Lorenzo sat back in his chair and laughed. His whole body shock. His laughter filled the courtyard and rolled off down the mountain. A pair of car headlights turned in to the drive, swept across the courtyard and briefly lit up the faces of the men sat around the table. An open topped sports coupe, loud dance music pumping from its stereo, pulled up at the side of the villa.
The men at the table did not turn round, they knew who it was. The music stopped and a harsh faced young man climbed out. He smoothed down his greased back hair and approached the table, “Greetings family.”
Ricardo held up a hand in greeting, “Ciao Guido.”
Guido Fuchs, born and raised in Switzerland, the son of a German father and an Italian mother, was the son-in-law of Tommaso. He lived in Zurich in a small apartment with his wife Fiorella, Tommaso’s eldest daughter, and their new baby daughter, Tommaso's first grandchild. He plonked himself down in the chair at the far end of the table and poured himself a glass of wine.
“New car Guido?” Said Ricardo, glancing over to where the shiny red sports car sat parked.
“Yes,” he took a drink of his wine, “I took delivery of it last week.”
“Looks like it cost a pretty penny.”
“Beauty does not come cheap.”
“What’s it like to drive?”
“Fast and she handles like a dream.”
“Not very practical, for a man with a new family.”
“Practicality doesn’t come in to it. In the property business, image is more important.”
Guido worked for a small letting agency, renting out flats and apartments in the poorer areas of Zurich and the surrounding towns. He lent bank in his chair and took another drink of his wine. “Whose is this? It’s good.” He said after swilling the wine around his mouth and swallowing.
“Your father-in-laws,” said Lorenzo smiling, “a tip from an old married man to a young one, if you want to keep on the right side of the in-laws, learn what the family wine tastes like.”
Guido gave a lipless grin and reached for a piece of bread.
Lorenzo turned back to Adolfo, “There are still things to discuss.”
“What’s to discuss?” said Adolfo, “Everything is settled. Everything will be fine.”
“For the moment,” said Tommaso, “but you can’t go on for ever.”
“Maybe not, but I’ve run this place for years and I reckon I can go on for a good few years more.”
“True, very true brother,” said Lorenzo patting Adolfo’s arm, “but you yourself have admitted that Rodolfo did more than his fair share.”
“Someone has got to help you,” said Tommaso, “and the question remains of who will take over when, well, in the future.”
Adolfo looked at Tommaso, “It will pass to Little Peppe. It is his by rights.”
“Yes, yes, but he is still a child. What you need is help now, especially with the business side.”
“Dino will do what he can.”
“I’m sure he will, but he has his job with Mr Cappella to worry about.”
“And what ever he is scribbling in that little book.” Said Lorenzo. The elder men at the table laughed, whether Dino had heard them they could not tell, he did not look up from his little book.
“What about the boy, Giacomo?” said Ricardo, jerking a thumb towards the end of the table.
Adolfo poured himself another plastic cup of grappa, “He needs to find himself a proper job first. He needs to learn some responsibility.”
Giacomo stabbed at a piece of cheese with a small fruit knife and then looked at his father, “I have a job.”
“What, selling watches from a suitcase on the market and running errands for the likes of Sicario.” Adolfo shook his head and took a drink of the grappa.
“I don’t hear you complaining when I bring my share to the table.”
“Your mother worries about you. These people you mix with, they are not good people.”
“You men they’re not old men and farmers.”
The table fell silent; Adolfo and Giacomo stared at one another.
“You need to learn some respect for your father.” Said Lorenzo, leaning forward in his chair.
“He needs to realise I have ambition. I don’t intend to end my days on this farm bent double and half blind.”
Adolfo laughed, “Ambition? What, to end up in prison or dead in some alley?”
“Even that would be better than this life. You’re an anachronism, a throwback to another time. Scratching away at the hard soil, hardly growing enough to feed the family. The world’s moved on and your sort has been left behind.
You sit there with your sheep and your chickens and you pretend every thing is alright, there’s food on the table and wine in your belly. Well some of us want more out of this life than to share a bedroom with a brother who spends his time off with the fairies and to have to think themselves grateful for being able to drive around in a car that’s a joke.”
Adolfo stood suddenly, knocking his chair over as he did so, grabbing at the buckle on his belt. “I may be an old man but, God help me, I can still teach you the meaning of respect.”
Giacomo stabbed the little knife in to the block of cheese and stood up. Tommaso laid his hand on Adolfo’s arm. Giacomo and his father stared at each other the young buck and the old stag. Giacomo snatched up his glass, drained it, slammed it down on the table and then turned and walked away towards the path that led around the side of the house and up to the pasture.
Tommaso held on to Adolfo’s, “Let him go brother.” Adolfo watched until Giacomo was out of sight, then he began to re-buckle his belt and sat down. Tommaso continued, “It has been a hard day for us all. We all react differently to things.”
Guido stood and picked up a bottle wine and two plastic cups, “I’ll go and talk to him, see if I can get him to calm down.” He left the table and set off up the path.
Lorenzo poured Adolfo another glass of wine, “He’s young brother, perhaps you should let him spread his wings a little. Let him see that the grass is not always greener on the other side.
“That’s not a bad Idea,” said Tommaso cutting at a piece of sausage, “You could send him to England,” he patted Ricardo on the shoulder, “I’m sure Ricci here would look after him, find him a job.”
Ricardo held up his hands, “No, no, no, I have two lazy sons of my own, and a daughter who thinks she doesn’t have to try at school ‘cause she’s going to be a pop star. I love Giacomo as if he was my own son, but I already have enough problems.
The other brothers laughed, more wine was poured, more food was eaten and the tension eased. They returned to discussing the important things in life; food, wine and football.

Guido followed the path around the side of the house and then made his way up the trail that led to the pasture. The sky had begun to darken and ahead of him the first of the night’s stars had begun to appear in the blue black sky. To his left, along the ridge of the mountains on the opposite side of the valley, the sky had turned fire red as streaks of yellow danced on the low, wispy clouds.
He crested the brow and spotted Giacomo sitting beneath the old olive trees the red glow of a cigarette lit up his face as he inhaled. Guido had seen an old photo of Adolfo sat beneath the same tree. The photo was black and white and hand tinted as was the fashion many years ago. Guido was struck by the resemblance between the two men. He had never noticed it before but now, as Giacomo sat beneath the same tree, he realised that father and son were a lot more alike then either would be prepared to admit. Giacomo did not look over as he approached but sat staring at the setting son and the lights of Suoloduro far below.
Guido poured some wine in to the two cups and held one out to Giacomo, “Here.”
Giacomo did not reply and so Guido sat down beside him and placed the bottle of wine and two cups between them, he reached in to an inside pocket, took out a packet of cigarettes and lit one.
“I thought you’d given up.” Said Giacomo, still staring dead ahead.
“No.”
“Really, Fiorella was saying you’d stopped for the baby.”
“No, Ella decided I was stopping for the baby, but I decided I wasn’t.”
“I bet she’s not happy about that?”
“What Ella doesn’t know, doesn’t upset her.”
“She’ll kill you when she finds out.”
“I do a lot of things that she would kill me for if she found out, but she’s not going to find out.” He picked up one of the cups of wine and took a drink, “It’s not bad; you should try it.”
Giacomo picked up the other cup and sniffed at the wine, “Zio Lorenzo.” He said and took a drink.
“You have to remember,” said Guido taking a drag of his cigarette, “they’re old men, this is all they know.”
“But why does it have to be all I know. They’ve had their time; they’ve lived their lives the way wanted.”
“Have they?”
“Yes, papa got the farm, and the others, well, they left here, they’ve got their own lives and families.”
“They may have left here, but they’re still tied to this farm. They still send money for Prima Nonna Etta.”
“I don’t want to end up like that. I don’t want to die like Rodolfo having achieved nothing and remembered as nothing more than a nice bloke. When I die I want people to remember me for a bit more than having drowned in a sewage pit.”
“Then you have to do something, only you can make it happen. Look at me, yes at the moment I’m working for some two-bit property company, but I don’t intend to stay there. I have a plan; within two years I will have my own company, within four I will be a millionaire.”
“I have plans…” said Giacomo indignantly.
“You have little schemes; you’re like the old men down there. You still think small.”
“I do not. I have ambition.” Giacomo took a last drag on his cigarette and flicked the butt in front of him, a shower of sparks exploded on the ground in front of them and briefly illuminated the grass and then died on the ground damp with evening dew, “I may be selling watches out of a suitcase now, but one day…”
“But one day what? You’ll have a market stall, perhaps a little shop in town.” Guido finished his wine, stood up and pointed down in to the valley, “The trouble with you people is that you don’t think any bigger than this valley.”
“I’m not like them…”
“Yes you are. What are twenty three, twenty four?”
“Twenty four.”
“And last year, for the first time, you left Italy. You came all the way to Switzerland for Donatella’s wedding. By the time I was your age I had been to America and Australia.”
“It’s not easy.” Giacomo poured himself another cup of wine.
“Getting what you want isn’t easy. You have to fight for it. If anybody gets in your way you have to go straight through them, even loved ones.” He turned back to face Giacomo, “If you really want success and money and then you are the only one who can make it happen, and you can’t let them down there on that little farm hold you back.”
“If I could, I’d leave tomorrow.”
“You wouldn’t get far. While this farm is still here, you’d still be here. Not down there in the fields scratching a living from the soil, but in here.” He jabbed a finger at Giacomo’s chest. He sat back down next to Giacomo and poured them both some more wine, “The problem is of course, they don’t realise what they’ve got.”
“What they’ve got is memories of better times, a few acres of hard, almost baron soil and a villa that’s like a fairground fun house.”
“You’re thinking like them again. Look, look around you.”
Giacomo stared in to the evening, down towards the farm, on towards the town and across the valley. Then he looked blankly at Guido.
“Good god boy,” said Guido standing and walking forward, he stopped suddenly and threw his arms out wide, “they have one of the best views in the whole fucking valley.” He turned back to face Giacomo, his arms still outstretched. “You don’t get it do you?”
“Well… I…”
“In Zurich I can rent a three bedroom apartment and get about Five hundred Euros a month,” he took at a cigarette, lit it and then squatted down in front of Giacomo, “but I can rent out a one bedroom apartment and get nine hundred and fifty euros a month, why?”
“The rooms are bigger?”
“No.”
“The facilities are better.”
“No.”
“I don’t know; it’s better decorated?”
“No… not even close. It’s the view.”
“The view?”
“Yes, the view. The three bedroom apartment is over looking Hurgen strasse, a main road with factories all down one side; the one bedroom apartment over looks Flugell Park, a beautiful expanse of woods and lakes. People will live in a shoe box if they can look out on to something beautiful.”
“Then those people are stupid.” Said Giacomo, taking a drink of his wine.
“Maybe? But they are also willing to pay, what ever the cost, for there own little piece of Italy.”
“Nobody in their right mind would pay for this little piece of Italy.”
“Yes they would cousin, believe me they would.”
“Why? There’s nothing here but rock and hard earth.”
“That’s what you see, because you’re on the inside looking in. What I see is potential and what they’d see is a little piece of Mother Italy. They see a connection with their roots, a return to simpler times; they want to live like their grand parents did; albeit with on-suite shower rooms, a fully equipped kitchen and a supermarket less than a ten minute drive away.”
“Why?”
“Why, why?” Guido turned round on his heels to face the valley and spread his arms wide again, “Because it’s a dream, an ideal. Trapped in their over crowded apartments they dream of retiring to a little villa they can call their own, with enough ground around it to grow a few fruit and veg, with grape vines up the front and a few chickens out the back. They can be peasant farmers ‘just like Nonna was’, they can moan about the youngsters not valuing the old ways and then tune in the satellite and crank up the heating.”
“People would really pay good money to live here?”
“Of course,” Guido turned back and faced Giacomo, “do you know what Masso is doing at the moment?”
“Probably drinking more grappa and singing an old folk tune.” Said Giacomo, laughing.
“No, not right at this moment; I mean… He is buying a plot of land in Wifesvillage, and do you know what he’s going to do it with it?”
“Build a villa on it?”
“Yes, he retires in two years time and so he’s buying a plot of land and building a villa.”
“But he has a nice apartment in Swisstown.”
“yes he does, but that is not Mother Italy, that is not the land of his birth.”
“Then why doesn’t he come back here and live on the farm.”
“You still don’t get this do you? He, like everybody else, wants the dream, not the harsh reality.”
Giacomo stood up and walk to the edge of the pasture. Down below he could see the lights of the Villa and hear the distorted echoing voices of the men in the courtyard.
Guido walked over to join him and handed him a small flask of grappa, “We all have dreams cousin. Some people spend their whole life chasing those dreams, others grab them at the earliest opportunity and don’t let go until they’ve achieved their goal.”
“And some of us have dreams that keep being squashed by the nightmares.” Giacomo took a drink of the grappa.
“Look at it Como,” Guido took the flask back and pointed down at the villa, “As it is, that place is not even worth the materials it’s built out of, but the right man with the right ideas could turn these few bare hectares in to a gold mine. And anybody who help him would be a very rich man, they’d never have to worry about being in debt ever again.” He slapped Giacomo on the back, “Come on, let’s go and join the old men before they drink all the good wine.”
“Go ahead; I’ll join you in a bit I just need to…”
“I know, don’t worry, I’ll save you a glass or two.”
As Guido made his way back down the path he turned and waved to Giacomo, who was sitting on a small rocky out crop staring down at the villa, the feint glow of a cigarette giving away his position. Guido took a large swig from the flask of grappa, did a little jig and said under his breath, “You’re a fucking genius Guido, a fucking A1 genius.”
There, Dear Reader, we will leave the Villa Fatiscente and its inhabitants. A family united by grief and divided by age. It is time to move our story on, so let us move.