and by duty, the right-hand man of Zi Peppe Pileri, who had brought him up on hoe and bread from an early age.
Young Ture was meek, but not a few times he came home red with rage and fisticuffs. He never offended anyone, he was respectful towards his elders, and he didn’t let anyone push him around.
His brothers were still little and only helped out on some occasions, such as during the harvest, the grape harvest, or the olive and hazelnut picking.
Ture, on the other hand, was already of an age to serve the family full-time. When he didn’t go with his father, because there wasn’t much work, he was hired by someone and walked home in the evening because there was only one mule in the family, used by Zi Peppe. If he had any luck, on the way back, there was a cart that would take him to San Basilio, and from there, he would continue along the mule track that connected the two villages. Sometimes, however, he had no luck and arrived in San Giorgio wet to the bone because, on the way, he had been caught in a gale and, in order to not remain in the dark, had walked without shelter under the pouring rain.
Since the beginning of the war, things had got worse for the family because the local farmers no longer hired Ture on a day-to-day basis. They seemed resentful because he had managed to be exempted from the military service, thanks to a recommendation his father had provided him with.
It was as if those men were complaining that Zi Peppe had not also recommended their sons. Strong arms were needed. The war was causing hunger and mourning for almost a year over those desolate lands of the Nebrodi mountains.
Zi Peppe knew well that some things were better done by himself and for himself, so he had pulled some strings only for his son Ture. Besides, he knew from experience that, if the situation were reversed, they would have provided only for their children so as not to lower the chance of saving them from the war.
He had succeeded, and he did not even feel guilty about it. He saw Ture working hard for his brothers and sisters and knew he had done the right thing.
Honest as he was, however, he did carry a little guilt inside: he had had to bow down to lord Marchiolo, a hardened fascist, who had rank and power at the Military District of Tortorici.
He had swallowed many bitter pills just for his son, to keep him with him in the fields and, above all, to save him from the horrors he had experienced on the Karst, and from almost certain death.
For this reason, when ‘Gnura Mena had cast the evil eye on him, he had felt it all over him! It was not just the words of a charlatan, but a common feeling that had crept into the souls and minds of the other villagers: why were their sons at war, while Ture, young and strong, was still serving his father?
The war had taken many strong arms from their families, and this was the major gripe.
People were starving, and hunger claimed more victims than war. And it took no prisoners.
III
At first, Ture wanted nothing to do with going to war, hearing his father’s gruesome tales. As soon as he was exempted from military duties, he went back to his village, and the next day he set off to work in the fields.
Summer arrived.
With time, however, this privilege began to take its toll on him, as he felt the eyes of everyone, especially the families who had soldiers at the front.
His behaviour began to be affected: he withdrew into himself. He became more and more quarrelsome and grumpy. Sometimes, when people asked him why he wasn’t at war, he would tell them stories he made up at the moment. He said he was waiting for being called to the front to some of them. Or that he was about to leave the following month. To others, that he was about to embark from Messina or that any more soldiers were needed. Time passed, and, at the end of July 1941, Ture was still in the fields harvesting with his father.
After a time, most people began to disbelieve these excuses, and many others, who learned the truth, accused him of being a coward, of bringing dishonour to their village. And even if they did not spit such contempt in his face for fear of getting a few punches in the jaw, they talked behind his back everywhere: at the mill, the haberdashery, the grain stores.
Ture would hear this chatter, and it would eat away at his pride, but when he got home in the evening, he would look his brothers and sisters in the eye, and the thought of these evil tongues soon disappeared. For this reason, he worked even harder. He felt that he owed to fate, then he busied himself with many more tasks than his father gave him daily.
August also arrived.
One evening, when he came back from the countryside a little earlier, he saw Concetta loaded down with some pitcher, intent on going to the trough near the river, and offered to help her.
“Why are you in a rush to help me?” His sister asked.
“Usually you nod your head and say thank you in these cases,” Ture replied.
“Are you coming to help your poor sister or to see your cousin Lia?”
Concetta’s question caught her brother off guard. Cousin Lia was nineteen years old. She was already shapely but not yet engaged. Ture had honestly never thought she could be anything more than a cousin.
“I’m not interested in Lia, and if you talk any more, you will go to the trough on your own!”
“No? Too bad...”
“Too bad, why?”
“Because Lia likes you!”
“Concetta, stop it! I don’t have time to be engaged now and don’t put ideas in our cousin’s head. Indeed tell her that your brother Ture doesn’t want her, so she’ll make her peace!”
“Then you can tell it to her if we find her at the trough.”
“I don’t have to tell her anything! That’s a lie you put in your head. Or maybe mum and dad want me to settle down with Lia? Tell me the truth!”
Ture, worried that his parents wanted to arrange a marriage with his cousin, stopped suddenly, put down the pottery pitchers, and waited anxiously for his sister’s reply. He had a debt of honour and gratitude to his father for the military service issue, but he did not want to settle it that way.
“Brother, calm down! Nobody knows anything. Lia confided in me, and that’s why I told you. If it’s not your will, then nothing will be done about it,” his sister said, resuming her walk.
Ture took up the pitchers again and started walking towards the trough. His sister’s reply had relieved him, and, with a slight grin, he continued the conversation: “And you, how is it that at eighteen you are already a matchmaker? If you want, I can find a suitor for you, sister dear!”
“Stop it, you moron, I can look after myself all right, and when I get engaged, no one will know! One evening I would take him home suddenly, and the next morning I get married!”
They burst into roaring laughter, and as they were close to the trough, they attracted the women’s attention, who were also intent on collecting water in their pitchers.
There was Lia, who seemed to have been waiting for that moment all her life. Concetta’s face was enough to dispel any illusion.
They spent some time apart, and Ture’s sister confessed that her cousin was not interested in her.
Then Lia, feeling rejected, was filled with rage faster than the pitchers being filled. Then she began to taunt Ture, always on the story of the war, of the exemption, of Zi Peppe Pileri’s recommendation.
Ture didn’t answer. He knew very well that these provocations came from a young woman whose pride was wounded, and he waited patiently for that trickle of water, now made feeble by the August heat, to fill the pitcher without uttering a word.
Suddenly, a young, witty voice broke the irritating blabber of Lia.
“Shut up, lizard!” On the other side of the big trough, Lia’s younger sister, Rosa, blurted