At the request of his father's mistress, Draifa, Athos Magnani arrives by train in the (fictional) town of Tara, where his father, also named Athos Magnani, was killed before his birth. The father, remembered as a resistance hero and whom his son greatly resembles, was killed by unknown fascists in 1936—or so says Draifa, the statue in the square, and everyone in the town. Draifa contacted Athos after seeing his picture in a newspaper and expects him to solve or avenge his father's murder. He hears that a few days before his father's death, a fortune teller had predicted his death, as in ''Macbeth'', and on his corpse was an unopened letter warning him not to go ahead, as in ''Julius Caesar (play)''.