The Project Gutenberg EBook of After the Divorce, by Grazia Deledda This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org Title: After the Divorce A Romance Author: Grazia Deledda Translator: Maria Hornor Lansdale Release Date: May 28, 2012 [EBook #39834] Language: English Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 *** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK AFTER THE DIVORCE *** Produced by Henry Flower and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.) AFTER THE DIVORCE A ROMANCE BY GRAZIA DELEDDA Translated from the Italian BY MARIA HORNOR LANSDALE And they shall scourge him, and put him to death; ... And they understood none of these things:.... —St. Luke xviii. 33, 34 colophon NEW YORK HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY 1905 Copyright, 1905 by HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY Published March, 1905 THE MERSHON COMPANY PRESS RAHWAY, N. J. PART I AFTER THE DIVORCE CHAPTER I Nineteen Hundred and Seven. In the "strangers' room" of the Porru house a woman sat crying. Crouched on the floor near the bed, her knees drawn up, her arms resting on her knees, and her forehead on her arms, she wept and sobbed continuously, shaking her head from time to time as though to indicate that there was no more hope, absolutely none at all; while her plump shoulders and straight young back rose and fell in the tightly fitting yellow bodice, like a wave of the sea. The room was nearly in darkness; there were no windows, but through the open door which gave upon a bricked gallery, a stretch of dull grey sky could be seen, growing momentarily darker; and far, far away, against this dusky background, gleamed the yellow ray of a little, solitary star. From the courtyard below came the shrill chirping of a cricket, and the occasional stamp of horses' hoofs on the stone pavement. A short, heavy woman, clad in the Nuorese dress, with a large, fat, old-woman face, appeared in the doorway; she carried a four-branched iron candlestick, in one socket of which burned a wick soaked in oil. "Giovanna Era," said she in a gruff voice, "what are you about all in the dark? Are you there? What are you doing? I believe you are crying! You must be crazy! Upon my word, that's just what you are—crazy!" The young woman began to sob convulsively. "Oh, oh, oh!" said the other, drawing near, and in the tone of one who is deeply shocked and amazed. "I said you were crying. What are you crying for? There's your mother waiting for you downstairs, and you up here, crying like a crazy creature!" [1] [2] [3] [4] The young woman wept more violently than ever, whereupon the other hung the candlestick on a large nail, gazed vaguely about her, and then began hovering over her disconsolate guest, searching for words wherewith to comfort her; she could only repeat, however: "But, Giovanna, you are crazy, just crazy!" The "strangers' room"—the name given to that apartment which every Nuorese family, according to immemorial custom, reserves for the use of friends from the country—was large, white, and bare; it had a great wooden bedstead, a table covered with a cotton cloth and adorned with little glass cups and saucers, and a quantity of small pictures hung close to the unpainted wooden ceiling. Bunches of dried grapes and yellow pears hung from the rafters, filling the room with a faint fragrance; and sacks of wool stood about on the floor. The stout woman, who was the mistress of the house, laid hold of one of these sacks, dragged it to another part of the room, and then back again to where she had found it. "Now then," said she, panting from her exertion, "do stop. What good does it do? And why should you give up, anyhow? What the devil, my dearie! Suppose the public prosecutor has asked for the galleys, that doesn't mean that the jury are all mad dogs like himself!" But the other only kept on crying and shaking her head, moaning: "No, no, no!" between her sobs. "Yes, yes, I tell you," urged the woman. "Get up now, and come to your mother," and, taking hold of her, she forced back her head. The action revealed a charming countenance; rosy, framed in a thick mass of tumbled black hair; the big dark eyes swollen and glistening with tears, and surmounted by heavy black eyebrows that met in the middle. "No, no," wailed Giovanna, shaking herself free. "Let me cry over my fate, Aunt Porredda." "Fate or no fate, you just get up!" "No, I won't get up! I won't get up! They'll sentence him to thirty years at the very least! Do you hear me? Thirty years! That's what they'll give him!" "That remains to be seen. And after all, what is thirty years? Why, you carry on like a wildcat!" The other gave a shrill cry, and tore her hair in an access of wild despair. "Thirty years! What is thirty years!" she shrieked. "A man's whole lifetime, Aunt Porredda! You don't know what you are talking about, Aunt Porredda! Go away, go away and leave me alone! for the love of Christ, oh, leave me to myself!" "I'm not going away," said Aunt Porredda. "The idea! In my own house! Get up, you child of the devil! Stop this before you make yourself ill. To-morrow will be time enough to pull your hair out by the roots; your husband isn't in the galleys yet!" Giovanna dropped her head, and began to cry again in a subdued, hopeless way, heartbreaking to listen to. "Costantino, Costantino," she moaned in the tone of one bewailing the dead, "I shall never see you again, never again! Those mad dogs have seized you and bound you fast, and they will never let you go; and our house will be empty, and the bed cold, and the family scattered. Oh, my beloved! my lamb! you are dead for this world. May those who have done it die the same death!" Aunt Porredda, distracted by Giovanna's grief, and unable to think of anything more to say, went out on the gallery, and began calling: "Bachissia Era! come up here; your daughter is losing her mind!" A step was heard on the outer stair. Aunt Porredda turned back into the room, and behind her appeared a tall, tragic- looking figure all in black. The gaunt, yellow face, shaped like that of some bird of prey, was framed in the folds of a black handkerchief; two brilliant green spots indicated the eyes, deep set, overhung by fierce, heavy brows, and surrounded by livid circles. Her mere presence seemed to exercise a subduing effect upon the daughter. "Get up!" she said in a harsh voice. Giovanna arose. She was tall and lithe, though cast in a heavy mould and having enormous hips. Beneath the short, circular petticoat, adorned below the waist with a band of purple, and with a broad, green hem, appeared two little feet shod in elastic gaiters, and the suggestion of a pair of shapely legs. "What are you worrying these good people for?" demanded the mother. "Have done now; come down to supper, and don't frighten the children, or throw a wet blanket over the happiness of these good people." The "happiness of these good people" was in allusion to the arrival of the son of the house, a law student, home for the holidays. Giovanna, recognising that her mother meant to be obeyed, quieted down without more ado. Pulling the woollen kerchief from her head, and thereby disclosing a cap of antique brocade, from whence escaped waves of coal-black hair, she turned towards a basin of water standing on a chair, and began to bathe her face. The two women looked at one another, and Aunt Porredda, taking her lips between her right thumb and forefinger in sign of silence, noiselessly left the room. The other, accepting this hint, said nothing more, and when Giovanna had finished bathing, and had set her hair in order, silently led the way down the outer stair. [5] [1] [6] [7] [8] Night had fallen; warm, still, profound. The solitary yellow star had been followed by a multitude of glittering asterisks, and the Milky Way lay like a scarf of gauze embroidered with silver spangles. The air was heavy with the penetrating odour of new-mown hay. In the courtyard, the crickets, hidden away in the trelliswork, kept up their shrill chirping; the ruminative horse still stamped with his iron-shod hoofs upon the stones, and from afar floated the melancholy note of a song. The kitchen opened on the courtyard, as did a ground-floor bedroom sometimes used as a dining-room. Both doors were standing open. In the kitchen, beside the lighted stove, stood Aunt Porredda engaged in preparing the macaroni for supper. A child, clad in a loose black frock, fair, untidy, and barefooted, was quarrelling with a stout little urchin, fat and florid like his grandmother. The girl was swearing roundly, naming every devil in turn; while the boy tried to pinch her bare legs. "Stop it," said Aunt Porredda. "There now, will you leave off, you naughty children?" "Mamma Porru, she's cursing me; she said: 'Go to the devil who gave you birth.'" "Minnia! what a way to talk!" "Well, he stole my purse, the one with the picture of the Pope, that Uncle Paolo brought me——" "It's not so, I didn't!" shouted the boy. "You'd better not be talking about stealing, Minnia," he added with a meaning look. The girl became suddenly quiet, as though a spell had been cast over her, but presently her tormentor, seizing a long stick, tried to hook the curved handle around her legs. Minnia began to cry, and the grandmother faced about, ladle in hand. "I declare, I'll beat you with this ladle, you wretched children! Just you wait a moment!" she cried, running at them. The children made a dash for the courtyard, and collided violently with Giovanna and her mother. "What's all this? What's all this?" "Oh, those children, they'll drive me wild! I believe the devil is in them," said Aunt Porredda from the doorway. At this moment a slim little figure in black emerged from the main gateway leading into the street, calling excitedly: "They are coming, Grandmother; here they are now!" "Well, let them come; you would do better, Grazia, to pay some attention to your brother and sister; they have been fighting like two cocks." Grazia made no reply, but taking the iron candlestick from Aunt Bachissia she blew out the light, and hid it behind a bench in the kitchen, saying in a low voice: "You ought to be ashamed, Grandmother, to have such a looking candlestick, now that Uncle Paolo is here." "Uncle Paolo! Well, I declare! Do you suppose he was brought up on gold?" "He has been to Rome." "To Rome! The idea! They only don't have lights like that there, because they have to buy their oil by the pennyworth. Here, we can use as much oil as we want." "You must be green if you believe that!" said the girl; then, suddenly catching the sound of her grandfather's and uncle's voices, she flew to meet them, trembling with excitement. "Good-evening, Giovanna; Aunt Bachissia, how goes it with you?" said the hearty voice of the student. "I? Very well, the Lord be praised! I was sorry to hear of your misfortune. Never mind, courage! Who knows? The sentence is to- morrow, is it not?" He led the way into the room where the supper-table was laid, followed by the two women and the children, whom their uncle's presence filled with mixed terror and delight. He was short and limped slightly, one foot being smaller than the other, and the leg somewhat shorter; this circumstance had earned him the nickname of Dr. Pededdu, a jest which he took in very good part, declaring that it was far better to have one foot smaller than the other, rather than a head smaller than those of other people. His fresh, round, smiling face, with its little blond moustache, was surmounted by a big, tattered black hat. He proclaimed himself a Socialist. Sitting down on the side of the bed, with both legs swinging, he threw an arm around each staring, open-mouthed child, and drew it to him, giving his attention meanwhile to Aunt Bachissia's recital of their misfortunes. From time to time, however, his gaze wandered to Grazia, the angles of whose girlish, undeveloped figure were accentuated by an ill-fitting black frock much too small for her. Her own hard, light-coloured orbs never left her uncle's face. "Listen," said Aunt Bachissia, in her harsh voice, "I will tell you the whole story. Costantino Ledda had an uncle by blood, his own father's brother. His name was Basile Ledda, but they called him 'the Vulture'—may God preserve him in glory if he's not fast in the devil's clutches already—because he was so grasping. "He was a wretch, a regular yellow vulture. God may have forgiven him, but there, they say he starved his wife to death! He was Costantino's guardian; the [9] [10] [11] [2] [12] boy had some money of his own, his uncle spent it all, and then began to ill-use him. He beat him, and sometimes he would tie him down between two stones in the open field, so that the bees would come and sting him on the eyes. Well, one day Costantino ran away; he was sixteen years old. For three years nothing was heard of him; he says he was working in the mines; I don't know, but anyhow, that's what he says." "Yes, yes, he was working in the mines," interrupted Giovanna. "I don't know," said the mother, pursing up her lips with an air of doubt, "well, anyway, the fact remains that one day, during the time that he was off, some one fired at Basile the Vulture out in the field. It is true he did have enemies. When Costantino came back he admitted that he had run away for fear he might be tempted to kill his uncle, he hated him so. "Afterwards, though, he tried to make his peace with him, and succeeded too. But now listen to this, Paolo Porru——" "Dr. Porru! Dr. Porreddu!" shouted the small nephew, correcting the guest. The latter, turning on the boy angrily, started to box his ears, whereupon Giovanna laughed. On beholding their heartbroken guest—she who up to that moment had been surrounded by a halo of romance and tragedy—actually laughing, the pale, lank Grazia broke into a nervous laugh as well, and then Minnia laughed, and then the boy, and then the student. Aunt Bachissia glared about her, and, lifting one lean, yellow hand, was about to bring it down on some one—she had not quite decided whether her daughter or the boy—when Aunt Porredda appeared in the doorway, bearing a steaming dish of macaroni. She was followed by Uncle Efes Maria Porru, a big, imposing-looking man, whose broad chest was uncomfortably contracted in a narrow blue velvet jacket. He was a peasant, but affected a literary turn; his large, colourless face resembled a mask of ancient marble; he wore a short, curling beard, and had thick lips always parted, and big, clear eyes. "Come, sit down at once," said Aunt Porredda, planting the dish in the centre of the table. "What! laughing, are you? The little doctor is making you all laugh?" "I was just about to give your grandson a box on the ear," said Aunt Bachissia. "And why were you going to do that, my soul? Come now, sit down, all of you; Giovanna, here; Dr. Porreddu, over there." The student threw himself back full-length on the bed, stretched out his arms, lifted his legs high in air, dropped them again, sat up, and jumped to his feet with a yawn. The children and Giovanna began to laugh again. "A little gymnastic exercise does one good. Great Lord! how I shall sleep to-night! My bones feel as though they had lost all their joints. How tall you have grown, Grazia; you look like a bean-pole." The girl reddened and dropped her eyes; while Aunt Bachissia thrust out her lips, annoyed at the student's lack of interest, as well as at the general indifference to Costantino's fate. To be sure, Giovanna herself had apparently forgotten, and it was only when Aunt Porredda placed before her a bountiful helping of macaroni covered with fragrant red gravy, that she suddenly recollected herself; her face clouded over, and she refused to eat. "There now! what did I tell you?" cried Aunt Porredda. "She is crazy, absolutely crazy! Why can't you eat? What has eating your supper to-night to do with the sentence to-morrow?" "Come, come," said Aunt Bachissia crossly. "Don't be foolish, don't go to work and spoil these good people's pleasure." "A brave heart," said Uncle Efes Maria pompously—fastening his napkin under his chin and seeing an opportunity for a learned observation—"a brave heart defies fate, as Dante Alighieri says. Come now, Giovanna, prove yourself a true flower of the mountains; more enduring than the rocks themselves. Time softens all things." Giovanna began to eat, but with a lump in her throat that made swallowing a difficult matter. Paolo, meanwhile, had not spoken a word, but sat bowed over his plate, which, by the time Giovanna had managed to get down her first mouthful, was entirely clean. "Why, you are a perfect hurricane, my son!" said Aunt Porredda. "What a ravenous appetite you have, to be sure! Do you want some more—yes?—and more still—yes——?" "Well done!" cried Uncle Efes Maria. "It looks as though you had found very little to eat in the Eternal City!" "Eh, that is precisely what I was saying just now," said Aunt Porredda. "Beautiful streets, if you will; but—when it comes to buying anything—the pennies have to be counted down! I've been told all about it! On my word, they say that there are no provisions stored in the houses as there are here, and you all know for yourselves that with no provisions in the house it is not easy to satisfy one's appetite!" Aunt Bachissia nodded affirmatively; she knew only too well what happens when there is nothing in a house to eat. "Is that true or not, Dr. Porreddu?" "True, perfectly true," said he, laughing, and eating, and waving his large, white hands with their long nails, in the air. "It is that that makes him such a leech, a regular vampire," said Uncle Efes Maria, turning to his guests. "I'll not have a [13] [14] [15] [16] drop of blood left in my veins. Body of the devil! how the money must go in Rome!" "Ah, if you only knew!" sighed Paolo. "Everything, every single thing is so frightfully dear. Twenty centimes for a single peach! There, I feel better now." "Twenty centimes!" exclaimed all the company in chorus. "Well, Aunt Bachissia, and then? After Costantino came back?" asked Paolo. "Well, Paolo Porru—you see I go on addressing you familiarly, even though you will be a doctor soon; when you were a little chap I used to go so far as to give you a cuff now and then——" "I have no recollection of it, but go on with your story," said the young man, while Grazia's nostrils fairly dilated with anger. "Well, as I said, Costantino disappeared for three years, and——" "He was working in the mines, all right; then he came back and was reconciled to his uncle. What then?" "He met my Giovanna here, and they fell in love with each other; but the uncle made objections because my girl was poor. Then they began to hate one another worse than ever. Costantino was working for the Vulture, and he would never let him have a centime. So, then, one day Costantino came to me and said: 'I'm a poor man; I haven't got any money to buy trinkets for the bride, or to provide a feast and all the rest for a Christian wedding; and you are poor, too. Now then, suppose we do this way: we will have the civil ceremony, and all live and work together; then, when we have saved enough, we will be married by God. A great many do it that way, why shouldn't we?' So we did; we had the civil ceremony very quietly, and afterwards we all lived together and were happy enough. But the Vulture was furious; he used to come and yell things at us even in our own street, and he tried to interfere with Costantino in every way he could. But we just kept on working. So at last, when the vintage was over last autumn, we began preparing the sweets and things for the wedding, and then Basile Ledda was found dead one day, murdered in his own house! The evening before, Costantino had been seen going in there; what he went for was to tell his uncle about the wedding, and to try to make his peace with him. Ah, poor boy! he would not run off and hide somewhere as I begged and implored him to do, so of course they arrested him." "He would not go because he was innocent, mamma, my——" "There you go, you simpleton, beginning to cry again! If you don't stop, I'll not say another word, so there! Well, then, Costantino was arrested, and now the trial is just over, and the public prosecutor has asked to have him sent to the galleys; but he's a dog, that public prosecutor! They have evidence, to be sure; Costantino was seen on the night of the murder entering his uncle's house, where he lived all by himself, like the wild beast that he was; and then their relations in the past—all true enough, but there are no proofs. Costantino was very contradictory, and full of remorse about something; he kept repeating: 'It is the mortal sin'; for you must know that he is a good Christian, and he thinks that this misfortune has been sent as a punishment because he and Giovanna lived together before they were married by religious ceremony." "But tell me one thing——" "Just wait a moment. I should add that now they have been married by religious ceremony—in prison! Yes, my dear, in prison; fancy what a horrid thing that was! Now don't begin crying again, Giovanna; if you do, I'll throw this salt-cellar at your head. There she is, the goose! Every one told her not to do it. 'Don't be married now,' they said. 'If he's found guilty and sentenced, you can marry some one else!'" "How contemptible!" began the young woman, with flashing eyes, but the mother merely turned a cold, penetrating look upon her, and she broke off at once. "Did I say so?" demanded the other. "No, it was other people, and they said it for your own good." "For my good, for my good," moaned Giovanna, burying her face in her hands; "there is no more good for me, ever again, ever again!" "Have you children?" asked Paolo. "Yes, one, a boy. If it were not for him—alas, alas! if Costantino is sentenced, and there were no child—then, oh, misery, misery——!" And she seized her hair by the roots, and began to drag her head violently from side to side, like an insane person. "You mean that you would kill yourself, my beloved?" asked Aunt Bachissia ironically. To the student there was something artificial in the action; it reminded him of a famous actress whom he had once seen in a French comedy, and this open display of grief only aroused his cynicism. "After all," said he, "the new divorce law has been approved, and any woman whose husband is serving a sentence can regain her freedom." Giovanna did not appear so much as to take in what he said, and continued to rock her head from side to side. Aunt Porredda, however, spoke up in a decided tone: "What an idea! as though any one but God could undo a marriage!" "Yes, I read about that in the papers," said Uncle Efes Maria jocularly. "Those are the divorces they get on the Continent, where men and women marry over and over again without troubling themselves about priests, or magistrates [17] [18] [19] either, for that matter, but here!—shame!" "No, Daddy Porru, that's not on the Continent, it's in Turkey," said Grazia. "Here too, here too," said Aunt Bachissia, who had eagerly followed every word. As soon as supper was over the two Eras went off to see their lawyer. "What room have you given them?" asked Paolo. "The 'strangers' room'?" "Why, of course; why?" "Because I really thought I should like to sleep there myself; it is suffocating down here. What better 'stranger' could there be than I?" "Be patient just till to-morrow, my boy. Remember these are poor guests." "O Lord! what barbarous customs! Will there ever be an end to them?" he exclaimed impatiently. "That's just what I should like to know," said Uncle Efes Maria. "These women are draining my pockets. Well, what do you think of the new Ministry?" "I don't think anything of it at all!" laughed the student, recalling a character in the Dame chez Maxim, a favourite play at the Manzoni Theatre, which he frequented. Then he sauntered off to look at some books he had left on a shelf at the other end of the room. Minnia and the boy had run out into the courtyard; Grazia, seated at the table, with both cheeks resting on her closed fists, was still gazing at her uncle. He turned towards her: "You read novels, don't you?" "I? No," she answered, turning red. "Well, I only wanted to say that if I ever catch you reading certain books—I'll rap you over the head with them." Her under-lip began to tremble, and, not to let him see her cry, she jumped up and ran out. In the courtyard she found the two children still quarrelling over the purse with the picture of the Pope. "As for stealing," the boy was saying, "you had better keep quiet about that; you, and she there—the bean-pole—you two sold some wine to-day, and kept the money!" "Oh, what a lie!" cried Grazia, falling upon him and dealing him a blow, but crying herself bitterly all the while. The courtyard was filled with the chirping of the crickets and the noise of the horses' hoofs; and the warm, starlit air was heavy with the scent of the hay. "You must not be hard on her, she is a poor orphan," said Aunt Porredda, speaking in Grazia's behalf (they were the three children of an older son of the Porrus', a well-to-do shepherd whose wife had died the year before). "And why not let her read if she wants to?" "Yes, yes, let her read by all means," said Uncle Efes Maria pompously. "Ah! if they had only allowed me to read when I was young—I would have been an astronomer, as learned as a priest!" To Uncle Efes Maria an astronomer represented the height of learning and cultivation—a philosopher, as it were. "Have you seen the Pope, my son?" asked Aunt Porredda, from an association of ideas. "No." "What! You have never seen the Pope?" "Oh! what do you expect? The Pope is kept shut up in a box; if you want to see him, you've got to pay well for it." "Oh, go along!" said she. "You are an infidel," and, going out to where the children were still fighting, she made a rapid descent upon them, separated the belligerents, and sent each flying in a different direction. "On my word!" she cried, "you are just like so many cocks. The Lord have mercy on me! Here they are, the chicken-cocks! Bad children, every one of you, bad, bad children!" And the lamentations of the youngsters arose and mingled with the noises of the summer evening. CHAPTER II The next morning Giovanna was the first to awaken. Through a pane of glass set in the door came a faint, roseate, sunrise glow; and the early morning silence was broken only by the chattering of the swallows. Not yet fully aroused, her first sensations were agreeable; then, all at once it was as though a terrific clap of thunder had sounded in her ear. She remembered! This was the day that was to decide her husband's fate. She knew for a certainty that he would be condemned, and yet she persisted in hoping still. It mattered very little to her whether or no he were guilty; probably she had not at any time troubled herself much with that aspect of the case, and what wholly concerned her now were the consequences. The thought of being parted, perhaps forever, from this man, young, strong, and active as a greyhound, with his caressing hands and ardent lips, was agony; and as the full consciousness of her misery came over her, she jumped out of bed, and began drawing on her clothes, saying breathlessly: "It is late, late, late." Aunt Bachissia opened her little firefly eyes, and then she also got up; but she realised too clearly what that day, and the [20] [21] [22] [23] [24] next, and the year following, and the next two, and five, and ten years would probably be like, to be in any haste to begin them. She dressed deliberately, plunged her hands into water, passed them across her face, and dried it, then carefully arranged the folds of her scarf about her head. "It is late," repeated Giovanna. "Dear Lord, how late it is!" But her mother's calm demeanour presently quieted her. Aunt Bachissia went down to the kitchen and Giovanna followed. Aunt Bachissia prepared the café-au-lait and bread for Costantino (the two women were allowed to take food to the prisoner), placed them in a basket, and started for the jail, Giovanna still following. The streets were deserted; the sun, just appearing above the granite peaks of Orthobene, filled the atmosphere with fine, rose-gold dust. The sky was so blue, the little birds so gay, and the air so still and fragrant, that it was like the early morning of some festal day, before the human bustle and the ringing of the church bells have disturbed the stillness and charm. Giovanna, crossing the street that leads from the station—near which the Porrus lived—to the prison, gazed upon her own violet-coloured mountains in the distance, hemming in the wild valleys below like a setting of amethysts; she inhaled the delicious air filled with the perfume of growing things; she thought of her little slate-rock house, of her child, of her lost happiness, and it seemed as though her heart would burst. The mother walked briskly on in front, poising the basket on her head. Presently they reached the great, round, white, desolate pile in which are the prisons. A sentry stood, mute and immovable, looking in the morning light like a statue carved out of stone. A single green shrub growing against the blank expanse of wall seemed the rather to accentuate the dreariness of the spot. A huge, green door, which from time to time opened and shut like the mouth of a dragon, now opened and swallowed up the two women. Every one in that dismal abode had come to know them; from the florid, important-looking head-keeper, who might have been a general at the very least, down to the junior custodian, with his pale face, his straight blond moustache, and his pretensions to elegance. The visitors were not allowed to penetrate beyond the gloomy passageway, whose fetid atmosphere, however, gave some idea of the horrors that lay beyond. The pale and elegant guard, coming forward, took their basket, and Giovanna asked in a low voice if Costantino had slept. Yes, he had slept, but he kept dreaming all the time. He did nothing but repeat over and over again the words—"The mortal sin!" "Ah! may he go to the devil with his mortal sin!" exclaimed Aunt Bachissia angrily; "he ought to stop it!" "Mamma, dear, why need you swear at him? Has not fate cursed him enough as it is?" murmured Giovanna. The women now left the building and stood outside, waiting for the prisoner to be brought forth. When Giovanna's eyes fell upon the group of carbineers who were to escort him to court, she fell to trembling violently, although on all the preceding days she had seen precisely the same thing; and her big, black eyes, stretched to their widest extent, fastened upon the great doorway with the unseeing stare of a crazy woman. Slowly the minutes lagged by, then the dragon mouth opened, and once more, surrounded by stony-faced guards with fierce black moustaches, the figure of Costantino appeared. He was tall and as lithe as a young poplar tree; a long lock of lustrous black hair hung down on either side of a face, beardless, pallid from prison confinement, and almost feminine in its beauty. The eyes were large, and chestnut-brown in colour; the mouth small, and as innocent as a child's, and there was a little cleft in the middle of the chin. He looked like a young Apollo. The moment his eyes fell upon Giovanna, although he too had been waiting for that moment, he grew whiter than ever, and stopped short, resisting the guards. Giovanna rushed forward, sobbing, and seized hold of his manacled hands. "Forward!" said one of the carbineers; then, gently, to her: "You know, my girl, it is not allowed." Aunt Bachissia now stepped forward as well, darting rapid glances out of her little green eyes. The escort halted for an instant, and Costantino, smiling bravely, said in a voice that was almost cheerful: "Courage! Courage!" "The lawyer is waiting for you," said Aunt Bachissia, and then the guards pushed the women gently aside. "Stand back, good people! Out of the way!" said one, and they led the prisoner off, still smiling back at Giovanna, his gleaming white teeth showing between lips that were still round and full, albeit colourless. Thus he disappeared from view between his stony-faced conductors. Aunt Bachissia now, in her turn, dragged off Giovanna, who wanted to follow her husband, and insisted that she should return first to the Porrus' for breakfast. They found the courtyard bathed in sunlight. It played upon the shining leaves of the grape-vines, from which hung bunches of unripe grapes like pale-green marble; the swallows disporting in it were moved to pour forth floods of song; and it tricked out Uncle Efes Maria, preparing to set out for the country on his chestnut horse. How full of light and cheerfulness seemed that little, enclosed spot, with its low stone-wall, beyond which could be seen a broad expanse of open country, stretching away to the distant horizon! The children sat on the threshold of the kitchen door, devouring their breakfast of bread soaked in café-au-lait; Grazia had taken hers to a retired corner, possibly in order not to be seen engaged upon anything so prosaic by the student-uncle. He, meanwhile, stood in his shirt-sleeves in the middle of the enclosure, gulping down the contents of a great bowl. [25] [26] [27] [28] "How large is St. Peter's?" asked Aunt Porredda, who was polishing the doctor's shoes, and marvelling the while to hear of the wonderful things he had seen. "How large? Why, as large as a tanca. You can't even pray there; no one could say his prayers in a tanca. The angels are as large as that gateway—the littlest ones—those that hold the holy-water basins." "Ah! then you have to go upstairs to reach the water?" "No; they are on their knees, I think. Give me a little more café-au-lait, mamma; is there any?" "Of course there is. It seems to me you have come back very hungry, my little Paolo; you're a regular shark!" "Do you know how much this breakfast would cost in Rome? One franc! not a centime less; and then the milk is all water!" "The Lord preserve us! Why, that is frightful!" "What do you think? I saw some dolphins at sea; the strangest-looking creatures——Oh! here are our guests; good-morning; what have you been about?" Giovanna described the meeting with her husband, and was beginning to cry again, when Aunt Porredda took her by the hand and led her into the kitchen. "You have need of all your strength to-day, my soul," said she, setting before her a large cup of café-au-lait. A little later the two women started out again for the Court of Assize; Paolo promising to join them there. "Courage!" said Aunt Porredda, as she took leave of Giovanna, and the latter heard her husband's sentence in the kind hostess's tone, and went off with the look of a whipped dog. Paolo followed her with his eyes; then, limping across the courtyard to his mother, he said a singular thing: "Listen to me, mamma; before two years have gone by that young woman will be married to some one else!" "What do you mean by saying such a thing, Dr. Pededdu!" cried the mother, who always addressed her son by his nickname when she was angry with him. "Upon my word, you must be crazy!" "Oh! mamma, I have crossed the sea," he replied. "Let us hope, at all events, that she will engage me as her lawyer." "That young man devours his food like a dog," said Giovanna to her mother, as they descended the steep little street. "May the Lord have mercy on him!" Aunt Bachissia, walking along plunged in thought, answered through her clenched teeth, "He will make a good lawyer; he will gnaw his clients to the bone and then swallow them whole!" Then the two walked on in silence, but a moment later Aunt Bachissia stumbled, and as she did so, for some reason that she could not fathom, it flashed into her mind that, should it ever so fall out that Giovanna were to apply for a divorce, she would ask Paolo to be their lawyer. It was eight o'clock when they reached the Cathedral Square, and the small windows of the Court House close by were sending back dazzling reflections of the early morning sun. The little granite-paved square was already crowded with country friends and neighbours, witnesses in the trial. Some of these immediately approached the two women, and greeted them with the inevitable commonplace: "Courage! Courage!" "Oh! courage; yes, we have plenty of it, thank you," said Aunt Bachissia. "Now leave us in peace." And she continued on her way, as proud and erect as a race-horse. The road was only too familiar already, and she followed it straight to the fateful hall. Behind her came Giovanna, and behind her, the others: heavily bearded, roughly clad men; a handful of idlers; last of all, a near-sighted old woman with no teeth. The jury, most of them old and fat, were already in their places. One of them had an enormous hooked nose; two others, fierce-eyed, thickly bearded men, looked like bandits; three sat in a little group with their heads close together, laughing over something in a newspaper. In a few moments the judge appeared, his rosy face surrounded by a straggling white beard. Then came the public prosecutor, a young man with a fair, drooping moustache, flushed and tyrannical-looking. Then the registrar, the ushers —all of these functionaries looking to Giovanna, in their black robes, like so many evil genii come to weave their fatal spells about poor Costantino. And there he was himself! Erect in the cage, like some frightened animal held in leash by the two stony-faced carbineers. His gaze was fastened upon Giovanna, but now there was no smile; he seemed overpowered by the weight of his misery; and, as his glance fell upon those men, the arbiters of his fate, his clear, childlike eyes contracted and grew dark with terror. Giovanna, too, seemed to feel the grip of an iron hand on her heart, and at times the sensation was so acute as to give her actual physical pain. The lawyer for the defence, a little pink-and-yellow man, with a high-pitched, querulous voice, began his speech. His defence had been sufficiently unfortunate from the first; now he merely repeated what had already been said; and his words seemed to fall into space like drops of water dripping into a great empty vessel. The public prosecutor, with his drooping moustaches, maintained an air of insolent indifference. A few of the jury appeared to take credit to themselves [3] [29] [30] [31] [32] for sitting through it with patience; while the others, so far as could be observed, did not so much as pretend to listen. The only persons present, in fact, who really took any interest in the summing up of the defence were Aunt Bachissia, Giovanna, and the prisoner; and the longer their advocate talked, the more did these feel that their case was hopelessly lost. From time to time some new arrival would take one of the seats behind Giovanna, and whenever this happened, she would turn quickly to see if it were Paolo. For some reason she found herself ardently wishing for him; she felt as though his mere presence in the courtroom might help them in some way. At last the lawyer ceased. Instantly, Costantino arose, and, growing very red in the face, asked if he might speak. "The —the"—said he, pointing in the direction of the advocate—"the gentleman-lawyer has spoken—he has defended me— and I thank him kindly; but he has not spoken the way I could have wished; he did not say—well, he did not say——" He stopped, breathing hard. "Add anything to your defence that occurs to you," said the judge. The prisoner stood for a moment with his eyes cast down, in an attitude of deep thought. The flush died out of his face, leaving it whiter than before; presently he passed his hand across his forehead with a convulsive movement, and raised his head. "This is it," he began in a low tone. "I—I——" but again his voice failed; then, suddenly clenching his fists, he turned towards the lawyer, and burst out in a voice of thunder: "But I am innocent! I tell you I am innocent!" The lawyer hastily motioned with his hand to quiet him; the judge raised his eyebrows, as though to say: "And suppose he had said so a hundred times, is it our fault that we are not convinced?" And a woman's sob was heard through the courtroom. Giovanna had broken down, and Aunt Bachissia at once dragged her towards the door, reluctant and tearful. Every one but the public prosecutor watched the struggle between the two women. A little later the court withdrew to deliberate. Aunt Bachissia, followed by two of the neighbours, hauled Giovanna into the square, where, instead of trying to comfort her, she fell to scolding her roundly. Was she quite mad? Did she want to be removed by force? "If you don't behave yourself," she concluded, "I declare I'll give you a good beating!" "Mamma, oh! mamma," sobbed the other. "They are going to condemn him! They are going to take him from me, and I can do nothing, I can do nothing——!" "What do you expect to do?" asked one of the neighbours. "As sure as I am alive there is nothing for you to do. Be patient, though, and wait a little longer——" At this moment three figures in black appeared, one of them laughing and limping. They were Paolo Porru and two young priests, friends of his. "There she is now," said the student. "It looks as though he had been sentenced already!" "Upon my word," remarked one of the priests, "she is indeed a young colt! One that knows how to kick, too! She looks——" The other one, meanwhile, was staring curiously at Giovanna, and as they all three approached the Eras, Paolo asked if the argument had closed. "It's the man who murdered his uncle, isn't it?" enquired one of the priests. The other continued to stare at Giovanna, who had begun to regain her self-control. "He has murdered no one at all," said Aunt Bachissia haughtily. "Murderer yourself, black crows that you are!" "Crows, are we? Well, you are a witch!" retorted the priest. Upon which the bystanders began to laugh. Giovanna, meanwhile, at the solicitation of Paolo, had become quite calm, and she now promised not to make a scene if they would let her return to the courtroom. They all, accordingly, went in together, and found that the jury, after a brief deliberation, were already taking their seats. A profound silence fell upon the dim, hot room. Giovanna heard an insect humming and buzzing against one of the windows; her limbs grew heavy; she felt as though her body, her arms, her legs, were strung on rods of ice-cold iron. Then the judge pronounced the sentence in a low, careless voice, while the prisoner looked at him fixedly and held his breath. Giovanna kept hearing the buzzing of the fly, and was conscious of a feeling of intense dislike for that rosy, white-bearded man, not so much on account of what he was saying, but because he said it with such an air of indifference. And this was what it was: A sentence of twenty-seven years' imprisonment "for the homicide who, after long premeditation, had at last committed the crime upon the person of his guardian and own uncle by blood!" Giovanna had so entirely prepared her mind to expect thirty years, that for the first moment twenty-seven seemed a respite, but it was only for a moment; then, swiftly realising that in thirty years three count for nothing, she had to bite her lips violently to keep back the shriek that rose to them. Everything grew dim before her; by a desperate effort of the will she forced herself to look at Costantino, and saw, or thought she saw, his face old and grey, his eyes, dim and vacant, wandering aimlessly about him. Ah! he was not looking at her, he was not even looking at her any more! Already he was parted from her forever. He was dead, though still among the living; they had killed him! Those fat, self-satisfied men, who sat there in perfect indifference, awaiting their next victim. She felt her reason forsaking her, and suddenly a [33] [34] [35] [36] succession of piercing shrieks rent the air; some one seized her, and she was dragged out again into the sunlit square. "Daughter! daughter! Do you know what you are doing? You must be mad! You are howling like a wild beast!" cried Aunt Bachissia, grasping her by the arm. "And what good will it do? There is the appeal still,—the Court of Cassation, —do be quiet, my soul!" All this had happened in a few moments. The witnesses, the lawyer, Paolo Porru, and the others now came crowding around the women, trying to think of something to say to comfort them. Giovanna, dry-eyed and staring, was sobbing in a heartbroken way, disjointed sentences falling from her lips, expressions of passionate tenderness for Costantino, and wild threats and imprecations addressed to the jury. She begged so hard to be allowed to remain until the condemned man should be brought out, that they agreed. At last he appeared; bent, livid, sunken-eyed; grown prematurely old. Giovanna rushed forward, and, as the carbineers made no motion to stop, she went ahead of them, walking backwards, smiling into her husband's face, telling him that it would all be set right in the Court of Cassation, and that she would sell everything, to the very clothes on her back, in order to save him. But he only stared back at her, wide-eyed, unseeing; and when the carbineers pushed her gently aside, one of them saying: "Go away, my good woman, go off now, and try to be patient," he too said: "Yes, go away, Giovanna, try to get permission to see me before I am taken away, and— bring the child, and take courage." So Giovanna and her mother went back to the house, where Aunt Porredda embraced and wept over them; then, however, appearing to repent of such weakness, she set about to remedy it. "Well," said she. "Twenty-seven years, what is that after all? Suppose he had been sentenced to thirty, would not that have been worse? What! You are going away? In this heat! Why, you must be crazy, both of you; upon my word, I shan't let you go." "Yes," said Aunt Bachissia; "we must get off; the others are all going back now, and will be company for us. But if it won't be putting you out too much, Giovanna will return in a few days and bring the boy." "Why, bless you! is not this house the same as your own?" They sat down to dinner, but Giovanna, though now perfectly calm, would touch nothing. Two or three times Aunt Porredda attempted to talk on indifferent subjects: she asked if the boy had cut his first teeth; remarked that travelling in such heat might make them ill; and enquired about the barley-crop in their neighbourhood. Profound peace brooded over the courtyard. The sun poured down on the grape-vines overhead, and traced delicate lacework patterns on the paving where it filtered through the leaves. The swallows flew hither and thither, singing joyously. Paolo sat reading the newspaper as he ate his dinner. Grazia and Minnia,—the boy had gone off with his grandfather,—in their sparse, tumbled little black dresses, kept falling asleep over theirs, overpowered by the noontide somnolence. Aunt Porredda's words floated dreamily out into all this sunlight and peace, into which Aunt Bachissia's tragic mien, and Giovanna's mute air of woe, seemed to strike a note of discord. The moment the meal was ended, the visitors packed their wallet, saddled their horse, and said farewell. Paolo promised to see their lawyer about the appeal to the Court of Cassation, and as soon as they were well out of sight, began to play with Minnia, forcing her to shake off her drowsiness, and pretending that he was crazy. He would first laugh uproariously, shaking in every limb; then, suddenly become perfectly silent, staring ahead of him with wild fixed gaze; then break forth once more into peals of laughter. The girls were highly diverted; they too fell to laughing immoderately; and the sun-bathed courtyard and tranquil house, freed at last from the gloomy presence of the guests, was filled with sunshine, and merriment, and peace. CHAPTER III Meanwhile, the Eras pursued their journey under the burning July sun. The road at first led downwards to the bottom of the valley; then crossed it and ascended the violet-coloured mountains that, shutting in the horizon beyond, lost themselves in the haze that rose from the heated earth. It was a melancholy progress. The two women rode one horse, a dejected-looking beast, tractable and mild. Their travelling companions had gradually drifted away; some riding on ahead; others falling behind, but all alike were silent and depressed, overpowered by the suffocating heat, the stillness, and the sad outcome of their journey. They felt Costantino's misfortune almost as keenly as the women themselves, and out of respect for Giovanna's dumb agony, either remained silent, or, if they spoke, did so in undertones that awoke no echoes, and failed even to break the intense silence. Thus they travelled on, and on; descending steadily towards the bed of a torrent, whose course ran through the bottom of the valley. The path, though not very steep, was rugged and at times difficult to follow as it wound its way between rocks, stretches of barren, dusty ground, and yellow stubble. At long intervals a scraggy tree would raise its solitary head; lifeless, immovable in the breathless atmosphere, like some lonely hermit of the wilderness; its shadow falling athwart the sun-baked earth, like that of a little wandering cloud, lost and frightened in the great expanse of light its presence alone seems to mar. Occasionally the shrill note of a wild bird would issue from one of these oases of shade, only...