To ANNAMARIA

FABRIZIO CASTELLANI arrived in Volterra one October evening in his Fiat Punto, with a couple of suitcases and the hopes of securing a researcher’s position at the University of Siena. A friend of his father’s had found him cheap accommodation on a farm in Val d’Era, not far from the city. The farmhouse had been vacant since earlier that year, when the previous tenant had left, having given up on the owner’s grand but sketchy plans to restructure the building and sell it to one of those Englishmen so enamoured of Tuscany.

The house had been added to in various stages over time around a core dating back to the thirteenth century. The oldest part was of stone, covered with ancient handmade roof tiles lichen-stained yellow and green on the north side, while the newer part was in brick. There was a pretty courtyard at the back, a tool shed and a hayloft. The land to the south hosted a dozen rows of big gnarled olive trees laden with fruit, as well as low vines still hanging with clusters of violet grapes and leaves that had started to turn bright red. The drystone wall that skirted the property was crumbling and needed fixing. Beyond the wall stretched a wood of oak trees that covered the hill all the way to its peak in a brilliant sweep of ochre, interrupted here and there by the red and gold of the mountain maples. An ancient box tree stood at the front entrance and a couple of cypresses, taller than the house’s roof, swayed on the other side.

A sparkling brook gushed from a spring close by, flowing over the clean gravel until it disappeared into the ditch at the roadside, only to re-emerge further downstream before descending to the Era. A thick blanket of vegetation hid the river itself, but its voice could be heard mixing with the rustling of the oaks and poplars.