Читать книгу Invictus - Cristiano Parafioriti - Страница 13

Zi Peppe Pileri was face to face with the one person he had been trying to avoid all morning. In those interminable moments, he cursed those two glasses of wine drunk at the little shop. He thought that if he had left without delay, he might have avoided that unwelcome encounter. But it was too late. The town messenger was standing there, in front of him and his mule, and he had to address him.

“At your service,” Zi Peppe replied.

And the messenger, without much pretence, got straight to the point.

“I have a draft notice for your son Salvatore. He lives in the village of San Giorgio. Can you confirm that?”

Zi Peppe, with all his confidence and pride, answered the messenger.

“I confirm! My son is in San Giorgio. He is now with the animals, but you will find him at home tonight. He is twenty years old and is my eldest son. I have three more boys beside him. They are eleven, eight, and three years old; I also have three girls. The oldest is eighteen, the second is fifteen, and the third is eight. Only the first two, Concetta and Sina, can help the family. The other four, as you can understand, are still children. So, dear sir, I talk with a heavy heart when I say that if you take Ture away from me now, it’s like cutting off my arm. No one questions that he must go, nor do I want to make him desert. He’ll go, and he’ll be a soldier, and I only ask one thing: leave him with me for a fortnight, just two more weeks! Today is Friday, right? Well, in two more Fridays I’ll come here again to collect the postcard, and I won’t even bother you to go as far as San Giorgio.

In the meantime, I’ll send him to a friend in Troina. The postcard will then go to Enna, and from there, one of your colleagues will notify him, and then he will have to leave. As you can see, I am well informed, and I do not want to tell you any lies or small talk. I wish I could spare my son a few months of war! I was in Karst in 1917. We were dying like flies. One day we were laughing and joking with a comrade and the next day half of us were dead! Don't give his mother this pain! Give her a few more days to get used to the idea of losing him, perhaps forever.”

The messenger stroked his hairless chin with his hand and then, with a condescending tone, replied: “Mr. Di Nardo, if I did that with all the young men, who would go to war? I’m only doing my duty, and I have to account for these postcards…”

“Are you a father, sir?”

“Yes, I have two children.”

“I have six little mouths to feed and a son who has to go to war... Please have a hand on your heart!”

The official reflected, looking around briefly, then turned to Zi Peppe with a resolute face.

“One week, that’s all I can do. I’ll come to San Giorgio, and you’ll have to tell me where you’ve sent him: town, address, name, and surname of the person who hired him. This is not a negotiable offer. Believe me, for your sake, I am going beyond my official duties. Needless to say, no one must know of our agreement. Otherwise, you will find me at your doorstep in San Giorgio, but this time with the Carabinieri! Go on... You and I have never met!”

Zi Peppe nodded gratefully and put the other half of the cheese into the messenger’s hands. In a flash, he jumped on the mule and urged it to set off. He realised that he could not have received a better offer than that and felt satisfied.

The messenger stowed what he had received inside the bag with the postcards, looked around to make sure, for the umpteenth time, that he had not been seen, and resumed his chores.

Arriving in San Giorgio at dusk, Zi Peppe took Nunzia and Ture aside and told them what had happened in the village. The woman sighed and curled up in her chair, distraught. He was her son and, although she was aware that her husband had done everything he could again, she couldn’t get used to the idea of losing her boy.

Ture, on the other hand, was thinking only of Rosa. He pondered the words his father said and searched inside himself for a way to tell this to his beloved. He had a week left, and then he would shelter in Troina until they would track him down and notify him of the date, by which he had to appear at the Military District in Messina. Finally, the front.

Firstly, he decided to reveal everything to Concetta. He had wanted to do so the night before, but the news of the incoming postcard had upset everyone, and he had had no way or time to talk to his sister.

That same evening, he made up his mind and told Concetta what had happened with Rosa, from the episode of the lizard to the afternoon spent at the trough. The girl smiled and, as usual, she surprised her elder brother again.

“I had imagined it. You should know that your sister has eyes and ears everywhere. I’m not surprised at all!”

“But how? I told Rosa not to say anything. We had agreed that…”

“Rosa didn’t tell me. It was too simple. I understood it by myself. I heard that you were at the fountain yesterday afternoon and it seemed strange to me. I thought: he never goes to the fountain and now he goes twice in such a short time! And then, I saw that the pitchers were halfway up, and I imagined that if you had gone there, it was not for the water but some other reason. Then I also heard that you were with Rosa, that you accompanied her home, and I connected these facts with the reaction our cousin had that time she called Lia a lizard. It was pure jealousy! The only thing I wasn’t sure about was whether you had already been seeing each other since before that night or if it was something born later, but now you have cleared everything up for me. Well done, brother Ture, you’ve caught the little dove at last!”

Ture was astonished; he thought he had done everything with the utmost reserve that time at the trough, but his sister had understood everything anyway. He felt like a fool, but it mattered little, and asked Concetta for advice on how he could tell Rosa about his imminent departure.

His sister eventually ruminated on Rosa’s words.

“If, as she told you, she has waited more than a year, will be able to do it again; indeed, now that you have declared your love, she has an even better reason. Now you are together, and she has the certainty that you want each other. Write to her, don’t forget and do as I say: send the letters for our mother here in San Giorgio, those for Rosa to me and have them delivered to Zi Strino’s shop in San Basilio; no one will suspect a brother at war who writes to his sister.”

Ture smiled and felt relieved, and the two hugged each other affectionately. He thought of what a good wife and excellent mother his sister would be one day. So clever and wise already at eighteen, who knows at twenty or twenty-five.

The next day Ture waited again for Rosa at the trough

As soon as she arrived, together with his sister, Ture called her aside, not caring about Lia’s reaction, who ignored him completely.

He reported the events of the previous day and those that would happen from then on.

“I have to go, Rosa. There are no saints to help me this time. It’s war!”

Rosa listened attentively to every word Ture said and sometimes shook her head in disbelief.

She had waited, had cherished that love that seemed impossible, defying her old sister’s anger. And now that she was ready to take flight, she couldn't fly like a little dove. The war clipped the wings of the ambitions and dreams of many young people.

She knew that but never before had she imagined that such a fate could befall her. And then, finally, the war which, at that moment, was also taking away her hope and knowledge of love itself.

She had been thinking over and over how to break the news to Lia and her mother, what words to use and how to fight to defend her feelings for Ture. In San Basilio, as in San Giorgio or the village, marriages were often made out of self-interest because people died of hunger but not love! Therefore, the will of the family was significant and, many times, crucial.

But Rosa would not have accepted impositions, and she had even considered facing the shame of an elope to get Ture. She would have run away with her beloved for a few days, she would have compromised herself with him, and then things would have worked out somehow.

She had heard of other girls who, to escape the impositions of the family or simply to accept an undesirable debt, finally decided to run away with their beloved at night. Yes! She would undoubtedly have done so because now she was sure that Ture Pileri loved her too. Although her heart was in pieces because of what was happening, she felt incredibly strong, and not even the war scared her.

She would wait for him for another year or more. What a pity, though! Just now that they had got engaged, the front was calling.

Would she see him again before he left? Or was this already their last time? No one could know.

Ture pulled Rosa behind a mulberry tree. Their lips touched in a long, deep kiss because they both wanted that kiss to remain in their hearts, like a trace, an indelible sign of their love.

Throughout the week, Ture and Rosa continued to see each other in secret. During those days, they tried to insert support strips next to the small and vulnerable creature that was their affection, similar to how they used to do in the countryside, to prop up the vine or the young and fragile tomato or bean plants.

It was as if they were looking deeply into each other: how much could they rely on each other?

Ture had before him a young girl who was only sixteen but who had been the driving force behind the whole thing: she had fallen in love with him, had waited for him, and had even put herself aside out of respect for her older sister who, in the family’s original plans, was to be destined for Ture. Then, when the tables had turned, she had taken action, seizing the right opportunity. In a flash, she had taken it. In Ture's mind, these were certainties.

But how long would the war last? How many things could happen? And then, the biggest hurdle was their families. A marriage between cousins was not difficult to digest, but his rejection of Lia could be an impossible obstacle. Yet Rosa seemed so determined! She looked like a lioness, and nothing frightened her. In front of the girl's certainties, Ture was afraid of appearing too soft, too indecisive. He didn’t want to appear doubtful because, quite frankly, he wasn’t.

He was only a few years older than her, therefore, he was trying to remain a little more grounded. The war had destroyed nations, homes, lives, and even loves, unfortunately. He knew that well.

“What if I never come back?” He repeated.

“If you don’t come back, it won’t be your problem anymore,” Rosa answered, almost sarcastically. But this answer certainly did not reassure Ture.

In those last days in San Giorgio, he had grown more afraid of leaving Rosa alone to face the pain of his death than of dying in the war. He had said this to her and got the sweetest answer in the world.

“It means you really love me! So I’m not wrong in loving you too!”

And it was true. Digging into his soul, Ture Pileri felt he loved Rosa more than his own life, and yet, from that moment on, ironically, he had to learn to love his life more.

If he wanted to reclaim Rosa on his return, he could only do so with his life on him. So he agreed that, when the impetus to live on the front line was gone, the thought of Rosa waiting for him would give him strength. She was the path and the light that would never let him lose hope.

However, the second to last evening, Zi Peppe surprised his son, telling him they were leaving for Troina at dawn.

Some farmers, who were also travelling to the inland parts of Sicily, had suggested they joined them in making the journey. First skirting the heights of Serra Corona and then cutting across the mule track that, passing through the Mangalaviti woods, wedged between Serra del Re and Pizzo Cannella. From there, they would easily reach Cesarò and then the road to Troina. So they would have left a day early, but at least they wouldn't have had to walk alone along that rough and difficult path.

Ture understood his father’s good intentions but, by doing so, he would never see Rosa again, who was obviously unaware of his early departure. He, therefore, sent an embassy to Concetta to tell Rosa of his sudden departure. His sister reassured him, but Ture’s soul was sad to the core.

The farewell was imminent.