At first, the town seemed abandoned. The only sign of life was a couple of dogs sleeping on a dusty old mat, in the shade of some bins. But around the corner, the town square appeared, filled with large balcony-clad houses that opened on to the valley of vineyards and olive groves, granting a panoramic view over the Puglia countryside, stretching almost to the Adriatic. Three carob trees and two holm oaks presided over this small oasis, and in the shade of the large, leafy branches two monuments rose, each covered with floral offerings and adorned with bows and ribbons striped in the colours of the Italian flag.
On a wooden bench with peeling paint sat an old man who had dozed off: his eyes were closed, his head tilted to one side and his mouth half open. He seemed to be having trouble breathing, or maybe he was already sleeping the sleep of the just and no one had realized; either way, it looked like he might never muster the strength to get up again. At his feet lay a dog, stretched out in that way only Mediterranean dogs can, in the paltry shade of the summer during the sunstroke hours. All around rang out the repetitive song of the cicadas scratching their bellies on some high branch of the carob trees in the windless air.
One of the monuments in the middle of the square was a monolith dedicated to the fallen of the First World War. A stone pillar engraved with a list of the local victims showed forty-two names, but a careful reading revealed something more: half of those dead had the last name Palmisano. Twenty-one men from the same family.
‘Giuseppe Oronzo Palmisano (one); Donato Fu Francesco Paolo Palmisano (two); Silvestro Palmisano (three); Gianbattista Di Martino Palmisano (four); Nicola Di Martino Palmisano (five); Giuseppe Fu Vito Palmisano (six) …’
The other memorial was dedicated to those fallen on the fronts of the Second World War. There wasn’t a single Palmisano on this list; perhaps the family and the last bearer of its name hadn’t survived the losses of the first war. This time, half of the dead were Convertinis.
‘Ventuno … sono ventuno!’ The old man on the bench sat up, awake, and said it again to the empty square, ‘Ventuno … sono ventuno!’
His face was grooved with wrinkles as he gazed at the monument. The dog had woken up as well, but he remained on the ground, his legs stretched out.
‘Twenty-one!’ he repeated quietly to himself. ‘All victims of the First War. La maledizione dei Palmisano!’