"Listen to the silence", says Michael.
As we lean against the railing of the terrace of the Villa Ombrone, our eyes are lost in the vast panorama illuminated by the setting sun. The eyes follow the green meanders of the trees that run along the river, then get lost in the multicolored puzzle of the fields, and then follow the rows of olive groves that go up the already blue hills.
"This silence" he says again.
The houses in the nearby villages start to light up. This is it, the magical moment - no longer day, not quite night. The wind has stopped. The swallows have ceased their squawking. Silence surrounds us. Or rather, the brief cry of a nocturnal bird of prey which disappears immediately, as if swallowed up by darkness, makes you think that silence reigns. Later it will be the barking of a deer which seems to be very close, echoed by another one, shortly after, as if reverberating in a deserted cathedral.
A shadow flies through the lights of the veranda: a bat. A moth buzzes for a moment around the lamp, makes us look up. Too late: it has already disappeared in the night.
Michael is right: the silence of Tuscan summer nights can be listenned to. It is the silence of nature that reclaims its rights when freshness returns to the earth and men return to their home.