Book: Stories by Foreign Authors: Italian

V >> Various >> Stories by Foreign Authors: Italian




"Pallura, poor Pallura, won't you answer?" He lay supine, his eyes
closed, his mouth half open, with brown soft hair on his cheeks and
chin, the gentle beauty of youth still showing in his features
contracted with pain. From beneath the bandage on his forehead a mere
thread of blood trickled down over his temples; at the corners of his
mouth stood little beads of pale red foam, and from his throat issued a
faint broken hiss, like the sound of a sick man gargling. About him
attentions, questions, feverish glances multiplied. The mare from time
to time shook her head and neighed in the direction of the houses. An
atmosphere as of an impending hurricane hung over the whole town.

Then from the square rang out the screams of a woman, of a mother. They
seemed all the louder for the sudden hushing of all other voices, and an
enormous woman, suffocated in her fat, broke through the crowd and
hurried to the wagon, crying aloud. Being heavy and unable to climb into
it, she seized her son's feet, with sobbing words of love, with such
sharp broken cries and such a terribly comic expression of grief, that
all the bystanders shuddered and averted their faces.

"Zaccheo! Zaccheo! My heart, my joy!" screamed the widow unceasingly,
kissing the feet of the wounded man and dragging him to her towards the
ground.

The wounded man stirred, his mouth was contorted by a spasm, but
although he opened his eyes and looked up, they were veiled with damp,
so that he could not see. Big tears began to well forth at the corners
of his eyelids and roll down over his cheeks and neck. His mouth was
still awry. A vain effort to speak was betrayed by the hoarse whistling
in his throat. And the crowd pressed closer, saying:

"Speak, Pallura! Who hurt you? Who hurt you? Speak! Speak!"

Beneath this question was a trembling rage, an intensifying fury, a deep
tumult of reawakened feelings of vengeance; and the hereditary hatred
boiled in every heart.

"Speak! Who hurt you? Tell us! Tell us!"

The dying man opened his eyes again; and as they were holding his hands
tightly, perhaps this warm living contact gave him a momentary strength,
for his gaze quickened and a vague stammering sound came to his lips.
The words were not yet distinguishable. The panting breath of the
multitude could be heard through the silence. Their eyes had an inward
flame, because all expected one single word.

"Ma--Ma--Mascalico--"

"Mascalico! Mascalico!" shrieked Giacobbe, who was bending over him,
with ear intent to snatch the weak syllables from his dying lips.

An immense roar greeted the cry. The multitude swayed at first as if
tempest-swept. Then, when a voice, dominating the tumult, gave the order
of attack, the mob broke up in haste. A single thought drove these men
forward, a thought which seemed to have been stamped by lightning upon
all minds at once: to arm themselves with some weapon. Towering above
the consciousness of all arose a sort of bloody fatality, beneath the
great tawny glare of the heavens, and in the electric odor emanating
from the anxious fields.



IV.

And the phalanx, armed with scythes, bill-hooks, axes, hoes, and guns,
reunited in the square before the church. And all cried: "San
Pantaleone!"

Don Consolo, terrified by the din, had taken refuge in a stall behind
the altar. A handful of fanatics, led by Giacobbe, made their way into
the principal chapel, forced the bronze grille, and went into the
underground chamber where the bust of the saint was kept. Three lamps,
fed with olive oil, burned softly in the damp air of the sacristy, where
in a glass case the Christian idol glittered, with its white head
surrounded by a broad gilt halo; and the walls were hidden under the
wealth of native offerings.

When the idol, borne on the shoulders of four herculean men, appeared at
last between the pillars and shone in the auroral light, a long gasp of
passion ran through the waiting crowd, and a quiver of joy passed like a
breath of wind over all their faces. And the column moved away, the
enormous head of the saint oscillating above, with its empty eye-sockets
turned to the front.

Now through the sky, in the deep, diffused glow, brighter meteors
ploughed their furrows; groups of thin clouds broke away from the hem of
the vapor zone and floated off, dissolving slowly. The whole town of
Radusa stood out like a smouldering mountain of ashes. Behind and
before, as far as eye could reach, the country lay in an indistinctly
lucent mass. A great singing of frogs filled the sonorous solitude.

On the river-road Pallura's wagon blocked the way. It was empty, but
still soiled, here and there, with blood. Angry curses broke suddenly
from the mob. Giacobbe shouted:

"Let us put the saint in it!"

So the bust was placed in the wagon-bed and drawn by many arms into the
ford. The battleline thus crossed the frontier. Metallic gleams ran
along the files. The parted water broke in luminous spray, and the
current flamed away red between the poplars, in the distance, towards
the quadrangular towers. Mascalico showed itself on a little hill, among
olive trees, asleep. The dogs were barking here and there, with a
persistent fury of reply. The column, issuing from the ford, left the
public road and advanced rapidly straight across country. The silver
bust was borne again on men's shoulders, and towered above their heads
amid the tall, odorous grain, starred with bright fireflies.

Suddenly a shepherd in his straw hut, where he lay to guard the grain,
seized with mad panic at sight of so many armed men, started to run up
the hill, yelling, "Help! Help!" And his screams echoed in the olive
grove.

Then it was that the Radusani charged. Among tree-trunks and dry reeds
the silver saint tottered, ringing as he struck low branches, and
glittering momentarily at every steep place in the path. Ten, twelve,
twenty guns, in a vibrating flash, rattled their shot against the mass
of houses. Crashes, then cries, were heard; then a great commotion.
Doors were opened; others were slammed shut. Window-panes fell
shattered. Vases fell from the church and broke on the street. In the
track of the assailants a white smoke rose quietly up through the
incandescent air. They all, blinded and in bestial rage, cried, "Kill!
kill!"

A group of fanatics remained about San Pantaleone. Atrocious insults for
San Gonselvo broke out amid waving scythes and brandished hooks:

"Thief! Thief! Beggar! The candles! The candles!"

Other bands took the houses by assault, breaking down the doors with
hatchets. And as they fell, unhinged and shivered, San Pantaleone's
followers leaped in, howling, to kill the defenders.

The women, half-naked, took refuge in corners, imploring pity. They
warded off the blows, grasping the weapons and cutting their fingers.
They rolled at full length on the floor, amid heaps of blankets and
sheets.

Giacobbe, long, quick, red as a Turkish scimitar, led the persecution,
stopping ever and anon to make sweeping imperious gestures over the
heads of the others with a great scythe. Pallid, bare-headed, he held
the van, in the name of San Pantaleone. More than thirty men followed
him. They all had a dull, confused sense of walking through a
conflagration, over quaking ground, and beneath a blazing vault ready to
crumble.

But from all sides began to come the defenders, the Mascalicesi, strong
and dark as mulattos, sanguinary foes, fighting with long spring-bladed
knives, and aiming at the belly and the throat, with guttural cries at
every blow.

The melee rolled away, step by step, towards the church. From the roofs
of two or three houses flames were already bursting. A horde of women
and children, wan-eyed and terror-stricken, were fleeing headlong among
the olive trees. Then the hand-to-hand struggle between the males,
unimpeded by tears and lamentations, became more concentrated and
ferocious.

Under the rust-colored sky, the ground was strewn with corpses. Broken
imprecations were hissed through the teeth of the wounded; and steadily,
through all the clamor, still came the cry of the Radusani:

"The candles! The candles!"

But the enormous church door of oak, studded with nails, remained
barred. The Mascalicesi defended it against the pushing crowd and the
axes. The white, impassive silver saint oscillated in the thick of the
fight, still upheld on the shoulders of the four giants, who refused to
fall, though bleeding from head to foot. It was the supreme desire of
the assailants to place their idol on the enemy's altar.

Now while the Mascalicesi fought like lions, performing prodigies on the
stone steps, Giacobbe suddenly disappeared around the corner of the
building, seeking an undefended opening through which to enter the
sacristy. And beholding a narrow window not far from the ground, he
climbed up to it, wedged himself into its embrasure, doubled up his long
body, and succeeded in crawling through. The cordial aroma of incense
floated in the solitude of God's house. Feeling his way in the dark,
guided by the roar of the fight outside, he crept towards the door,
stumbling against chairs and bruising his face and hands.

The furious thunder of the Radusan axes was echoing from the tough oak,
when he began to force the lock with an iron bar, panting, suffocated by
a violent agonizing palpitation which diminished his strength, blind,
giddy, stiffened by the pain of his wounds, and dripping with tepid
blood.

"San Pantaleone! San Pantaleone!" bellowed the hoarse voices of his
comrades outside, redoubling their blows as they felt the door slowly
yield. Through the wood came to his ears the heavy thump of falling
bodies, the quick thud of knife-thrusts nailing some one through the
back. And a grand sentiment, like the divine uplift of the soul of a
hero saving his country, flamed up then in that bestial beggar's heart.



V.

By a final effort the door was flung open. The Radusani rushed in, with
an immense howl of victory, across the bodies of the dead, to carry the
silver saint to the altar. A vivid quivering light was reflected
suddenly into the obscure nave, making the golden candlesticks shine,
and the organ-pipes above. And in that yellow glow, which now came from
the burning houses and now disappeared again, a second battle was
fought. Bodies grappled together and rolled over the brick floor, never
to rise, but to bound hither and thither in the contortions of rage, to
strike the benches, and die under them, or on the chapel steps, or
against the taper-spikes about the confessionals. Under the peaceful
vault of God's house the chilling sound of iron penetrating men's flesh
or sliding along their bones, the single broken groan of men struck in a
vital spot, the crushing of skulls, the roar of victims unwilling to
die, the atrocious hilarity of those who had succeeded in killing an
enemy,--all this re-echoed distinctly. And a sweet, faint odor of
incense floated above the strife.

The silver idol had not, however, reached the altar in triumph, for a
hostile circle stood between. Giacobbe fought with his scythe, and,
though wounded in several places, did not yield a hand's breadth of the
stair which he had been the first to gain. Only two men were left to
hold up the saint, whose enormous white head heaved and reeled
grotesquely like a drunken mask. The men of Mascalico were growing
furious.

Then San Pantaleone fell on the pavement, with a sharp, vibrant ring. As
Giacobbe dashed forward to pick him up, a big devil of a man dealt him a
blow with a bill-hook, which stretched him out on his back. Twice he
rose and twice was struck down again. Blood covered his face, his
breast, his hands, yet he persisted in getting up. Enraged by this
ferocious tenacity of life, three, four, five clumsy peasants together
stabbed him furiously in the belly, and the fanatic fell over, with the
back of his neck against the silver bust. He turned like a flash and put
his face against the metal, with his arms outspread and his legs drawn
up. And San Pantaleone was lost.






IT SNOWS

BY

ENRICO CASTELNUOVO

The Translation by Edith Wharton.


The thermometer marks barely one degree above freezing, the sky is
covered with ominous white clouds, the air is harsh and piercing; what
can induce Signor Odoardo, at nine o'clock on such a morning, to stand
in his study window? It is true that Signor Odoardo is a vigorous man,
in the prime of life, but it is never wise to tempt Providence by
needlessly risking one's health. But stay--I begin to think that I have
found a clue to his conduct. Opposite Signor Odoardo's window is the
window of the Signora Evelina, and Signora Evelina has the same tastes
as Signor Odoardo. She too is taking the air, leaning against the
window-sill in her dressing-gown, her fair curls falling upon her
forehead and tossed back every now and then by a pretty movement of her
head. The street is so narrow that it is easy to talk across from one
side to the other, but in such weather as this the only two windows that
stand open are those of Signora Evelina and Signor Odoardo.

There is no denying the fact: Signora Evelina, who within the last few
weeks has taken up her abode across the way, is a very fascinating
little widow. Her hair is of spun gold, her skin of milk and roses, her
little turned-up nose, though assuredly not Grecian, is much more
attractive than if it were; she has the most dazzling teeth in the most
kissable mouth; her eyes are transparent as a cloudless sky, and--well,
she knows how to use them. Nor is this the sum total of her charms: look
at the soft, graceful curves of her agile, well-proportioned figure;
look at her little hands and feet! After all, one hardly wonder that
Signor Odoardo runs the risk of catching his death of cold, instead of
closing the window and warming himself at the stove which roars so
cheerfully within. It is rather at Signora Evelina that I wonder; for,
though Signer Odoardo is not an ill-looking man, he is close upon forty,
while she is but twenty-four. So young, and already a widow--poor
Signora Evelina! It is true that she has great strength of character;
but six months have elapsed since her husband's death, and she is
resigned to it already, though the deceased left her barely enough to
keep body and soul together. Happily Signora Evelina is not encumbered
with a family; she is alone and independent, and with those eyes, that
hair, that little upturned nose, she ought to have no difficulty in
finding a second husband. In fact, there is no harm in admitting that
Signora Evelina has contemplated the possibility of a second marriage,
and that if the would-be bridegroom is not in his first youth--why, she
is prepared to make the best of it. In this connection it is perhaps not
uninstructive to note that Signor Odoardo is in comfortable
circumstances, and is himself a widower. What a coincidence!

Well, then, why don't they marry--that being the customary denouement in
such cases?

Why don't they marry? Well--Signor Odoardo is still undecided. If there
had been any hope of a love-affair I fear that his indecision would have
vanished long ago. Errare humanum est. But Signora Evelina is a woman of
serious views; she is in search of a husband, not of a flirtation.
Signora Evelina is a person of great determination; she knows how to
turn other people's heads without letting her own be moved a jot.
Signora Evelina is deep; deep enough, surely, to gain her point. If
Signor, Odoardo flutters about her much longer he will! singe his wings;
things cannot go on in this; way. Signor Odoardo's visits are too
frequent; and now, in addition, there are the conversations from the
window. It is time for a decisive step to be taken, and Signor Odoardo
is afraid that he may find himself taking the step before he is prepared
to; this very day, perhaps, when he goes to call on the widow.

The door of Signor Odoardo's study is directly opposite the window in
which he is standing, and the opening of this door is therefore made
known to him by a violent draught.

As he turns a sweet voice says:

"Good-bye, papa dear; I'm going to school."

"Good-bye, Doretta," he answers, stooping to kiss a pretty little maid
of eight or nine; and at the same instant Signora Evelina calls out from
over the way:

"Good-morning, Doretta!"

Doretta, who had made a little grimace on discovering her papa in
conversation with his pretty neighbor, makes another as she hears
herself greeted, and mutters reluctantly, "Good-morning."

Then, with her little basket on her arm, she turns away slowly to join
the maid-servant who is waiting for her in the hall.

"I am SO fond of that child," sighs Signora Evelina, with the sweetest
inflexion in her voice, "but she doesn't like me at all!"

"What an absurd idea!...Doretta is a very self-willed child."

Thus Signor Odoardo; but in his heart of hearts he too is convinced that
his little daughter has no fondness for Signora Evelina.

Meanwhile, the cold is growing more intense, and every now and then a
flake of snow spins around upon the wind. Short of wishing to be frozen
stiff, there is nothing for it but to shut the window.

"It snows," says Signora Evelina, glancing upward.

"Oh, it was sure to come."

"Well--I must go and look after my household. Au revoir--shall I see you
later?"

"I hope to have the pleasure--"

"Au revoir, then."

Signora Evelina closes the window, nods and smiles once more through the
pane, and disappears.

Signor Odoardo turns back to his study, and perceiving how cold it has
grown, throws some wood on the fire, and, kneeling before the door of
the stove, tries to blow the embers into a blaze. The flames leap up
with a merry noise, sending bright flashes along the walls of the room.

Outside, the flakes continue to descend at intervals. Perhaps, after
all, it is not going to be a snowstorm.

Signor Odoardo paces up and down the room, with bent head and hands
thrust in his pockets. He is disturbed, profoundly disturbed. He feels
that he has reached a crisis in his life; that in a few days, perhaps in
a few hours, his future will be decided. Is he seriously in love with
Signora Evelina? How long has he known her? Will she be sweet and good
like THE OTHER? Will she know how to be a mother to Doretta?

There is a sound of steps in the hall; Signor Odoardo pauses in the
middle of the room. The door re-opens, and Doretta rushes up to her
father, her cheeks flushed, her hood falling over her forehead, her warm
coat buttoned up to her chin, her hands thrust into her muff.

"It is snowing and the teacher has sent us home."

She tosses off her hood and coat and goes up to the stove.

"There is a good fire, but the room is cold," she exclaims.

As a matter of fact, the window having stood open for half an hour, the
thermometer indicates but fifty degrees.

"Papa," Doretta goes on, "I want to stay with you all day long to-day."

"And suppose your poor daddy has affairs of his own to attend to?"

"No, no, you must give them up for to-day."

And Doretta, without waiting for an answer, runs to fetch her books, her
doll, and her work. The books are spread out on the desk, the doll is
comfortably seated on the sofa, and the work is laid out upon a low
stool.

"Ah," she cries, with an air of importance, "what a mercy that there is
no school to-day! I shall have time to go over my lesson. Oh, look how
it snows!"

It snows indeed. First a white powder, fine but thick, and whirled in
circles by the wind, beats with a dry metallic sound against the window-
panes; then the wind drops, and the flakes, growing larger, descend
silently, monotonously, incessantly. The snow covers the streets like a
downy carpet, spreads itself like a sheet over the roofs, fills up the
cracks in the walls, heaps itself upon the window-sills, envelops the
iron window-bars, and hangs in festoons from the gutters and eaves.

Out of doors it must be as cold as ever, but the room is growing rapidly
warmer, and Doretta, climbing on a chair, has the satisfaction of
announcing that the mercury has risen eleven degrees.

"Yes, dear," her father replies, "and the clock is striking eleven too.
Run and tell them to get breakfast ready."

Doretta runs off obediently, but reappears in a moment.

"Daddy, daddy, what do you suppose has happened? The dining-room stove
won't draw, and the room is all full of smoke!"

"Then let us breakfast here, child."

This excellent suggestion is joy to the soul of Doretta, who hastens to
carry the news to the kitchen, and then, in a series of journeys back
and forth from the dining-room to the study, transports with her own
hands the knives, forks, plates, tablecloth, and napkins, and, with the
man-servant's aid, lays them out upon one of her papa's tables. How
merry she is! How completely the cloud has vanished that darkened her
brow a few hours earlier! And how well she acquits herself of her
household duties!

Signor Odoardo, watching her with a sense of satisfaction, cannot resist
exclaiming: "Bravo, Doretta!"

Doretta is undeniably the very image of her mother. She too was just
such an excellent housekeeper, a model of order, of neatness, of
propriety. And she was pretty, like Doretta, even though she did not
possess the fair hair and captivating eyes of Signora Evelina.

The man-servant who brings in the breakfast is accompanied by a
newcomer, the cat Melanio, who is always present at Doretta's meals. The
cat Melanio is old; he has known Doretta ever since she was born, and he
honors her with his protection. Every morning he mews at her door, as
though to inquire if she has slept well; every evening he keeps her
company until it is time for her to go to bed. Whenever she goes out he
speeds her with a gentle purr; whenever he hears her come in he hurries
to meet her and rubs himself against her legs. In the morning, and at
the midday meal, when she takes it at home, he sits beside her chair and
silently waits for the scraps from her plate. The cat Melanio, however,
is not in the habit of visiting Signor Odoardo's study, and shows a
certain surprise at finding himself there. Signor Odoardo, for his part,
receives his new guest with some diffidence; but Doretta, intervening in
Melanio's favor, undertakes to answer for his good conduct.

It is long since Doretta has eaten with so much appetite. When she has
finished her breakfast, she clears the table as deftly and promptly as
she had laid it, and in a few moments Signor Odoardo's study has resumed
its wonted appearance. Only the cat Melanio remains, comfortably
established by the stove, on the understanding that he is to be left
there as long as he is not troublesome.

The continual coming and going has made the room grow colder. The
mercury has dropped perceptibly, and Doretta, to make it rise again,
empties nearly the whole wood-basket into the stove.

How it snows, how it snows! No longer in detached flakes, but as though
an openwork white cloth were continuously unrolled before one's eyes.
Signor Odoardo begins to think that it will be impossible for him to
call on Signora Evelina. True, it is only a step, but he would sink into
the snow up to his knees. After all, it is only twelve o'clock. It may
stop snowing later. Doretta is struck by a luminous thought:

"What if I were to answer grandmamma's letter?"

In another moment Doretta is seated at her father's desk, in his arm-
chair, two cushions raising her to the requisite height, her legs
dangling into space, the pen suspended in her hand, and her eyes fixed
upon a sheet of ruled paper, containing thus far but two words: Dear
Grandmamma.

Signor Odoardo, leaning against the stove, watches his daughter with a
smile.

It appears that at last Doretta has discovered a way of beginning her
letter, for she re-plunges the pen into the inkstand, lowers her hand to
the sheet of paper, wrinkles her forehead and sticks out her tongue.

After several minutes of assiduous toil she raises her head and asks:

"What shall I say to grandmamma about her invitation to go and spend a
few weeks with her?"

"Tell her that you can't go now, but that she may expect you in the
spring."

"With you, papa?"

"With me, yes," Signor Odoardo answers mechanically.

Yet if, in the meantime, he engages himself to Signora Evelina, this
visit to his mother-in-law will become rather an awkward business.

"There--I've finished!" Doretta cries with an air of triumph.

But the cry is succeeded by another, half of anguish, half of rage.

"What's the matter now?"

"A blot!"

"Let me see?...You little goose, what HAVE you done?...You've ruined the
letter now!"

Doretta, having endeavored to remove the ink-spot by licking it, has
torn the paper.

"Oh, dear, I shall have to copy it out now," she says, in a mortified
tone.

"You can copy it this evening. Bring it here, and let me look at
it...Not bad,--not bad at all. A few letters to be added, and a few to
be taken out; but, on the whole, for a chit of your size, it's fairly
creditable. Good girl!"

Doretta rests upon her laurels, playing with her doll Nini. She dresses
Nini in her best gown, and takes her to call on the cat, Melanio.

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