'Yes, it's not bad. Are you thirsty?'
'Yes.'
'Go and get a couple of beers from the fridge. I have to do this now or the mortar will set.'
As with Antonella's farmhouse, the living accommodation was on the first floor. Unlike Antonella's place, Fausto's home was stuffed to bursting with furniture, pictures, books and other curiosities. In the middle of the kitchen table was an upturned German helmet, painted pink and doubling as a flowerpot, a bushy fern sprouting from it. The ramshackle shelves in one corner of the room were almost exclusively given over to books on warfare and historic battles. Knowing that to delay anymore would mean he'd been snooping, he grabbed a couple of beers from the fridge and headed back outside.
As soon as Fausto was done slapping the mortar around a few more blocks of stone, he took Adam on a tour. They inspected the vines, the olive trees, the orchard, the maize and the sunflowers.
There was also an extensive vegetable patch, as well as a large jerry-built coop with chickens busy turning table scraps into eggs. The crops were clearly suffering from the lack of rain, but it didn't seem to bother Fausto. 'Everything a man needs,' he declared with pride. 'Except a woman to share it with.'
They drank the next two beers in the shade of a vine-threaded pergola beside the house. Adam asked about the books on battles heaped up on the shelves in the corner of the kitchen.
'I'm interested, it's true. So much of who we are, what we are, comes down to a bunch of men fighting in a field.'
Adam smiled. He hadn't thought of it in those terms before.
'In twelve sixty,' said Fausto, 'Florence and Siena went to war. September third. It was a Saturday.'
Adam's Italian wasn't up to catching all of the details, but as he understood it, this was how things unfolded. Siena was already a divided city, and the Florentines weren't fools. They waited till the different factions were at each others' throats before sending in their messengers, two horsemen carrying with them a simple yet stark ultimatum: If the Republic of Siena didn't surrender at once to Florence, then the city would be razed to the ground. It wasn't an idle threat. The Florentine army massing to the east was more than capable of following it through.
The one thing the Florentines hadn't banked on was the Sienese burying their differences overnight. Sworn enemies gathered before the cathedral that same evening and greeted each other like brothers. Then they called on the Virgin Mary to help them in the forthcoming battle.
The two armies clashed the following day at Montaperti. According to eyewitness accounts, there was enough blood flowing at one point to drive four watermills. By far the greater part of it was Florentine blood. That field near Montaperti was home to a massacre, and it was years before any animals ever ventured near it.
'Imagine it,' said Fausto. 'The next day was a Sunday. That's when the Sienese army returned. They dragged the Florentine banner through the streets behind an ass. You think those bastard Sienese have forgotten that day? Of course they haven't. It's what they teach their children in school. It's in their eyes every time we play them at football.'
Fausto paused to light a cigarette.
'People think of Italy as an old country. It isn't. We're young, younger than the United States. We only united in 1870, not even a hundred years ago. We're not a country yet, and we won't be for a while. These things take a long time. No, those bastard Sienese haven't forgotten Montaperti. It's part of who they are. In the same way Hastings is part of who you English are. That's one of the great battles. You know why? Because a bunch of men fighting in that one field changed the whole course of your country's history.'
Fausto took a slug of beer.
'But you didn't come here to talk about this stuff. Am I wrong?'
'No.'
'So tell me.'
'I have a question. It's about Gaetano.'
'Gaetano?'
'The gardener who left last year.'
'I know who Gaetano is.'
'Where is he now?'
'Viareggio. By the sea. He owns a bar there, a fancy place—La Capannina.'
'You've been there?'
Fausto spread his arms to indicate his disheveled appearance. 'What do you think?'
'How much does a fancy bar in Viareggio cost?'
'Apparently he inherited some money from his family down south.' There was a note of skepticism in his voice.
'You don't believe it?'
'How do I know? More to the point, what do you care?'
Adam gathered himself, then took the plunge. 'The last time I saw you, you said Gaetano changed his story about what happened the night Emilio died.'
'Was I drunk?'
'You lied?'
'Why do you want to know?'
