|Padron ’Ntoni, when his grandson came home to him drunk in the
evening, did his best to get him off to bed without letting him be
seen by the others, because such a thing had never been known among the
Malavoglia, and old as he was, it brought the tears to his eyes. When he
got up by night to call Alessio to go out to sea, he let the other one
sleep; for that matter, he wouldn’t have been of any use if he had gone.
At first ’Ntoni was ashamed of himself, and went down to the landing
to meet them with bent head. But little by little he grew hardened, and
said to himself, “So I shall have another Sunday to-morrow, too!”
The poor old man did everything he could think of to touch his heart,
and even went so far as to take a shirt of his to Don Giammaria to be
exorcised, which cost him thirty centimes.
“See,” he said to ’Ntoni, “such things were never known among the
Malavoglia! If you take the downward road, like Rocco Spatu, your
brother and your sister will go after you. ‘One black sheep spoils the
flock.’ And those few pence which we have put together with such pains
will all go again--‘for one fisherman the boat was lost ‘--and what
shall we do then?”
’Ntoni stood with his head down, or growled something between his
teeth; but the next day it was the same thing over again; and once he
said:
“At least if I lose my head, I forget my misery.”
“What do you mean by misery? You are young, you are healthy, you
understand your business; what do you want more? I am old, your brother
is but a boy, but we have pulled ourselves out of the ditch. Now, if you
would help us we might become once more what we were in other days; not
happy as we were then, for the dead cannot return to us, but without
other troubles; and we should be together, ‘like the fingers of a hand,’
and should have bread to eat. If I close my eyes once for all, what is
to become of you? See, now I tremble every time we put out to sea, lest
I should never come back. And I am old!”
When his grandfather succeeded in touching his heart ’Ntoni would
begin to cry. His brother and sisters, who knew all, would run away and
shut themselves up, almost as if he were a stranger, or as if they
were afraid of him; and his grandfather, with his rosary in his hand,
muttered, “O blessed soul of Bastianazzo! O soul of my daughter-in-law
Maruzza! pray that a miracle may be worked for us.” When Mena saw him
coming, with pale face and shining eyes, she met him, saying, “Come this
way; grandfather is in there!” and brought him in through the little
door of the kitchen; then sat down and cried quietly by the hearth; so
that at last one evening ’Ntoni said, “I won’t go to the tavern again,
no, not if they kill me!” and went back to his work with all his former
good-will; nay, he even got up earlier than the rest, and went down to
the beach to wait for them while it wanted still two hours to day; the
Three Kings were shining over the church-tower, and the crickets could
be heard trilling in the vineyards as if they had been close by. The
grandpapa could not contain himself for joy; he went on all the time
talking to him, to show how pleased he was, and said to himself, “It
is the blessed souls of his father and his mother that have worked this
miracle.”
The miracle lasted all the week, and when Sunday came ’Ntoni wouldn’t
even go into the piazza, lest he should see the tavern even from a
distance, or meet his friends, who might call him. But he dislocated his
jaws yawning all that long day, when there was nothing to be done. He
wasn’t a child, to go about among the bushes on the down, singing, like
Nunziata and his brother Alessio; or a girl, to sweep the house, like
Mena; nor was he an old man, to spend the day mending broken barrels or
baskets, like his grandfather. He sat by the door in the little street,
where not even a hen passed by the door, and listened to the voices and
the laughter at the tavern. He went to bed early to pass the time, and
got up on Monday morning sulky as ever. His grandfather said to him, “It
would be better for you if Sunday never came, for the day after you are
just as if you were sick.” That was what would be best for him--that
there should not even be Sunday to rest in; and his heart sank to think
that every day should be like Monday. So that when he came back from the
fishing in the evening, he would not even go to bed, but went about
here and there bemoaning his hard fate, and ended by going back to the
tavern. At first when he used to come home uncertain of his footing, he
slipped in quietly, and stammered excuses, or went silently to bed; but
now he was noisy, and disputed with his sister, who met him at the door
with a pale face and red eyes, and told him to come in by the back way,
for that grandfather was there.
“I don’t care,” he replied. The next day he got up looking wretchedly
ill, and in a very bad humor, and took to scolding and swearing all day
long.
Once there was a very sad scene. His grandfather, not knowing what to
do to touch his heart, drew him into the corner of the little room,
with the doors shut that the neighbors might not hear, and said to him,
crying like a child, the poor old man! “Oh, ’Ntoni, don’t you remember
that here your mother died? Why should you disgrace your mother, turning
out as badly as Rocco Spatu? Don’t you see how poor Cousin Anna works
all the time for that big drunkard of a son of hers, and how she weeps
at times because she has not bread to give to her other children, and
has no longer the heart to laugh? ‘Who goes with wolves turns wolf,’ and
‘who goes with cripples one year goes lame the next.’ Don’t you remember
that night of the cholera that we were all gathered around that bed, and
she confided the children to your care?”
’Ntoni cried like a weaned calf, and said he wished he could die, too;
but afterwards he went back--slowly, indeed, and as if unwillingly, but
still he did go back--to the tavern, and at night, instead of coming
home, he wandered about the streets, and leaned against the walls, half
dead with fatigue, with Rocco Spatu and Cinghialenta; or he sang and
shouted with them, to drive away his melancholy.
At last poor old Padron ’Ntoni got so that he was ashamed to show
himself in the street. His grandson, instead, to get rid of his sermons,
came home looking so black that nobody felt inclined to speak to him.
As if he didn’t preach plenty of sermons to himself; but it was all the
fault of his fate that he had been born in such a state of life. And
he went off to the druggist, or to whoever else would listen to him, to
exhaust himself in speeches about the injustice of everything that there
was in this world; that if a poor fellow went to Santuzza’s to drink
and forget his troubles, he was called a drunkard; while those who drank
their own wine at home had no troubles, nor any one to reprove them or
hunt them off to work, but were rich enough for two, and did not need
to work, while we were all the sons of God, and everybody ought to share
and share alike.
“That fellow has talent,” said the druggist to Don Silvestro or Padron
Cipolla or to anybody else whom he could find. “He sees things in the
lump, but an idea he has. It isn’t his fault if he doesn’t express
himself properly, but that of the Government, that leaves him in
ignorance.” For his instruction he lent him the _Secolo_ (the _Age_) and
the _Gazette of Catania_.
But ’Ntoni very soon got tired of reading; first, because it was
troublesome, and because while he was a soldier they had made him learn
to read by force; but now he was at liberty to do as he liked, and,
besides, he had forgotten a good deal of it, and how the words came one
after another in printing. And all that talk in print didn’t put a penny
in his pocket. What did it matter to him? Don Franco explained to him
how it mattered to him; and when Don Michele passed across the piazza he
shook his head at him, winking, and pointed out to him how he came after
Donna Rosolina as well as others, for Donna Rosolina had money, and gave
it to people to get herself married.
“First we must clear away all these fellows in uniform. We must make a
revolution, that’s what we must do.”
“And what will you give me to make the revolution?”
Don Franco shrugged his shoulders, and went back to his mortar, for
talking to such people as that was just beating water with a pestle,
neither more nor less, he said.
But Goosefoot said, as soon as ’Ntoni’s back was turned, “He ought to
get rid of Don Michele, for another reason--he’s after his sister; but
’Ntoni is worse than a pig now that Santuzza has taken to keeping
him.” Goosefoot felt Don Michele to be a weight on his mind since
that active official had taken to looking askance at Rocco Spatu and
Cinghialenta and himself whenever he saw them together; for that he
wanted to get rid of him.
Those poor Malavoglia had come to such a pass that they were the talk
of the place, on account of their brother. Now, everybody knew that Don
Michele often walked up and down the black street to spite the Zuppidda,
who was always mounting guard over her girl, with her distaff in her
hand. And Don Michele, not to lose time, had taken to looking at Lia,
who had now become a very pretty girl and had no one to look after her
except her sister, who would say to her, “Come, Lia, let us go in; it is
not nice for us to stand at the door now we are orphans.”
But Lia was vain, worse than her brother ’Ntoni, and she liked to
stand at the door, that people might see her pretty flowered kerchief,
and have people say to her, “How pretty you look in that kerchief,
Cousin Lia!” while Don Michele devoured her with his eyes Poor Mena,
while she stood at the door waiting for her drunken brother to come
home, felt so humbled and abased that she wanted the energy to order her
sister to come in because Don Michele passed by, and Lia said:
“Are you afraid he will eat me? Nobody wants any of us now that we have
got nothing left. Look at my brother, even the dogs will have nothing to
say to him!”
If ’Ntoni had a spark of courage, said Goosefoot, he would get rid of
that Don Michele. But ’Ntoni had another reason for wishing to get rid
of Don Michele. Santuzza, after having quarrelled with Don Michele, had
taken a fancy to ’Ntoni Malavoglia for that fashion he had of wearing
his cap, and of swaggering a little when he walked, that he had learned
when he was a soldier, and used to hide for him behind the counter the
remains of the customers’ dinners, and to fill his glass as well now and
then on the sly. In this way she kept him about the tavern, as fat and
as sleek as the butcher’s dog. ’Ntoni meantime discharged himself, to
a certain extent, of his obligation to her by taking her part, sometimes
even to the extent of thumps, with those unpleasant people who chose to
find fault with their bills, and to scold and swear about the place for
ever so long before they would consent to pay them. With those who were
friends with the hostess, on the contrary, he was chatty and pleasant,
and kept an eye on the counter, too, while Santuzza went to confession;
so that every one there liked him and treated him as if he were at home.
All but Uncle Santoro, who looked askance at him, and muttered, between
one Ave Maria and another, against him, and how he lived upon his girl
like a canon, without lifting a finger; Santuzza replying that she was
the mistress, and if it were her pleasure to keep ’Ntoni Malavoglia
for herself as fat as a canon, she should do it; she had no need of
anybody.
“Yes, yes,” growled Uncle Santoro, when he could get her for a minute by
herself. “You always need Don Michele! Master Filippo has told me time
and again that he means to have done with it, that he won’t keep
the wine in the cellar any longer, and we must get it into the place
contraband.”
“Don Filippo must attend to his own affairs. But I tell you once for
all, that if I have to pay the duty twice over, I won’t have Don Michele
here again. I won’t, I won’t!”
She could not forgive Don Michele the ugly trick he had played her with
the Zuppidda, after all that time that he had lived like a fighting-cock
at the tavern for love of his uniform; and ’Ntoni Malavoglia, with no
uniform at all, was worth ten of Don Michele; whatever she gave to him
she gave with all her heart. In this way ’Ntoni earned his living,
and when his grandfather reproved him for doing nothing, or his sister
looked gravely at him with her large melancholy eyes, he would reply:
“And do I ask you for anything? I don’t spend any money out of the
house, and I earn my own bread.”
“It would be better that you should die of hunger,” said his
grandfather, “and that we all fell dead on the spot.”
At last they spoke no more to each other, turning their backs as they
sat. Padron ’Ntoni was driven to silence sooner than quarrel with
his grandson, and ’Ntoni, tired of being preached to, left them there
whining, and went off to Rocco Spatu and Cousin Vanni, who at least were
jolly? and could find every day some new trick to play off on somebody.
They found one, one day, which was to serenade Uncle Crucifix the night
of his marriage with his niece Vespa, and they brought under his windows
all the crew, to whom Uncle Crucifix would no longer lend a penny, with
broken pots and bottles, sheep’s bells, and whistles of cane, making the
devil’s own row until midnight; so that Vespa got up the next morning
rather greener than usual, and railed at that hussy of a Santuzza, in
whose tavern all that noisy raff had got up that nasty trick; and it was
all out of jealousy she had done it, because she couldn’t get married
herself as Vespa had.
Everybody laughed at Uncle Crucifix when he appeared in the piazza in
his new clothes, yellow as a corpse, and half frightened out of his wits
at Vespa and the money she had made him spend for his new clothes. Vespa
was always spending and spilling, and if he had left her alone would
have emptied his money-bags in a fortnight; and she said that now she
was mistress, so that there was the devil to pay between them every day.
His wife planted her nails in his face, and screamed that she was going
to keep the keys herself; that she didn’t see why she should want a bit
of bread or a new kerchief worse than she did before; and if she had
known what was to come of her marriage, with such a husband, too! she
would have kept her fields and her medal of the Daughters of Mary. And
he screamed, too, that he was ruined; that he was no longer master in
his own house; that now he had the cholera in his house in good earnest;
that they wanted to kill him before his time, to waste the money that he
had spent his life in putting together! He, too, if he had known how
it would be, would have seen them both at the devil, his wife and her
fields, first; that he didn’t need a wife, and they had frightened him
into taking Vespa, telling him that Brasi Cipolla was going to run off
with her and her fields. Cursed be her fields!
Just at this point it came out that Brasi Cipolla had allowed himself to
be taken possession of by the Mangiacarubbe, like a great stupid lout as
he was; and Padron Fortunato was always hunting for them up and down on
the heath, in the ravine, under the bridge, everywhere, foaming at the
mouth, and swearing that if he caught them he would kick them as long
as he could stand, and would wring his son’s ears off for him.
Uncle Crucifix, at this, became quite desperate, and said that the
Mangiacarubbe had ruined him by not running off with Brasi a week
sooner. “This is the will of God!” he said, beating his breast. “The
will of God is that I should have taken this Wasp to expiate my sins.”
And his sins must have been heavy, for the Wasp poisoned the bread in
his mouth, and made him suffer the pains of purgatory both by day and by
night.
The neighbors never came near the Malavoglia now, any more than if the
cholera were still in the house; but left her alone, with her sister in
her flowered kerchief, or with Nunziata and her cousin Anna, when they
had the charity to come and chat with her a bit. As for Anna, she was
as badly off as they were with her drunkard of a son, and now everybody
knew all about it; and Nunziata, too, who had been so little when that
scamp of a father of hers had deserted her and gone elsewhere to seek
his fortune. The poor things felt for each other, for that very reason,
when they talked together, in low tones, with bent heads and hands
folded under their aprons, and also when they were silent, each absorbed
in her own pain.
“When people are as badly off as we are,” said Lia, speaking like a
grown-up woman, “every one must take care of one’s self, and look after
one’s own interests.”
Don Michele, every now and then, would stop and joke with them a little,
so that the girls got used to his gold-bound cap, and were no longer
afraid of him; and, little by little, Lia began to joke with him
herself, and to laugh at him; nor did Mena dare to scold her, or to
leave her and go into the kitchen, now they had no mother, but stayed
with them crouching on the door-step, looking up and down the street
with her tired eyes. Now that they were deserted by the neighbors, they
felt their hearts swell with gratitude towards Don Michele, who, with
all his uniform, did not disdain to stop at the Malavoglia’s door for a
chat now and then. And if Don Michele found Lia alone he would look into
her eyes, pulling his mustaches, with his gold-bound cap on one side,
and say to her, “What a pretty girl you are, Cousin Malavoglia!”
Nobody else had ever told her that, so she turned as red as a tomato.
“How does it happen that you are not yet married?” Don Michele asked her
one day.
She shrugged her shoulders, and answered that she did not know.
“You ought to have a dress of silk and wool, and long ear-rings; and
then, upon my word, there’d be many a fine city lady not fit to hold a
candle to you.”
“A dress of silk and wool would not be a proper thing for me, Don
Michele,” replied Lia.
“But why? Hasn’t the Zuppidda one? And the Mangiacarubbe, now that she
has caught Brasi Cipolla, won’t she have one too? And Vespa, too, can
have one if she likes.”
“They are rich, they are.”
“Cruel fate!” cried Don Michele, striking the hilt of his sword with his
fist. “I wish I could win a tern in the lottery, Cousin Lia. Then I’d
show you what I’d do.”
Sometimes Don Michele would add, “Permit me,” with his hand to his cap,
and sit down near them on the stones. Mena thought he came for Barbara,
and said nothing. But to Lia Don Michele swore that he did not come
there on account of Barbara, that he never had, that he never should,
that he was thinking of quite a different person--did not Cousin Lia
know that? And he rubbed his chin and twisted his mustaches and stared
at her like a basilisk. The girl turned all sorts of colors, and got up
to run into the house; but Don Michele caught her by the hand, and said:
“Do you wish to offend me, Cousin Malavoglia? Why do you treat me in
this way? Stay where you are; nobody means to eat you.”
So, while they were waiting for the men to come back from sea, they
passed the time, she in the door, and Don Michele on the stones,
breaking little twigs to pieces because he did not know what to do with
his hands. Once he asked her, “Would you like to go and live in town?”
“What should I do in town?”
“That’s the place for you! You were not meant to live here with these
peasants, upon my honor! You are of a better sort than they are; you
ought to live in a pretty little cottage, or in a villa, and to go to
the marina, or to the promenade when there is music, dressed prettily,
as I should like to see you--with a pretty silk kerchief on your head,
and an amber necklace. Here I feel as if I were living in the midst
of pigs. Upon my honor I can hardly wait for the time when I shall be
promoted, and recalled to town, as they have promised me, next year.”
Lia began to laugh as if it were all a joke, shaking her shoulders
at the idea. She, who didn’t know even what silk kerchiefs or amber
necklaces were like.
Then one day Don Michele drew out of his pocket, with great mystery,
a fine red and yellow silk kerchief wrapped up in a pretty paper, and
wanted to make a present of it to Cousin Lia.
“No, no!” said she, turning fiery red. “I wouldn’t take it, no, not if
you killed me.”
Don Michele insisted. “I did not expect this, Cousin Lia; I do not
deserve this.” But after all, he had to wrap the kerchief once more in
the paper and put it back into his pocket.
After this, whenever she caught a glimpse of Don Michele, Lia ran off
to hide herself in the house, fearing that he would try to give her the
kerchief. It was in vain that Don Michele passed up and down the street,
the Zuppidda screaming at him all the time; in vain that he stretched
his neck peering into the Malavoglia’s door; no one was ever to be seen,
so that at last he made up his mind to go in. The girls, when they saw
him standing before them, stared, open-mouthed, trembling as if they had
the ague, not knowing what to do.
“You would not take the silk kerchief, Cousin Lia,” he said to the girl,
who turned red as a poppy, “but I have come all the same, because I like
you all so much. What is your brother ’Ntoni doing now?”
Now Mena turned red too, when he asked what her brother ’Ntoni was
doing, for he was doing nothing. And Don Michele went on: “I am afraid
he will do something that you will not like, your brother ’Ntoni. I am
your friend, and I take no notice; but when another brigadier comes in
my place he will be wanting to know what your brother is always about
with Cinghialenta and that other pretty specimen, Rocco Spatu, down by
the Rotolo in the evening, or walking about the downs, as if they had
nothing to do but to wear out their shoes. Look after him well, Cousin
Mena, and listen to what I tell you tell him not to go so much with that
meddling old wretch Goosefoot, in Vanni Pizzuti’s shop, for we know
everything; and he will come to harm among them. The others are old
foxes. And you had better tell your grandfather to stop him from walking
so much up and down the beach, for the beach is not meant to walk about
on; and the cliffs of the Rotolo have ears, tell him; and one can see
very well, even without glasses, the boats that put out from there at
dusk, as if they were going to fish for bats. Tell him this, Cousin
Mena; and tell him, too, that this warning comes from one who is your
friend. As for Master Cinghialenta, and Rocco Spatu, and Vanni Pizzuti
as well, we have our eye on them. Your brother trusts old Goosefoot, but
he does not know that the coastguards have a percentage on smuggled
goods, and that they always manage to get hold of some one of a gang,
and give him a share to spy on them that they may be surprised.”
Mena opened her eyes still wider, and turned pale, without quite
understanding all this long speech; but she had been trembling already
for fear that her brother would get into trouble with the men in
uniform. Don Michele, to give her courage, took her hand, and went on:
“If it came to be known that I had warned you, it would be all over with
me. I am risking my uniform in telling you this, because I am so fond of
all you Malavoglia. But I should be very sorry if your brother got into
trouble. No, I don’t want to meet him some night in some ugly place
where he has no business; no, I wouldn’t have it happen to catch a booty
worth a thousand francs, upon my honor I wouldn’t.”
The poor girls hadn’t a moment’s peace after Don Michele had warned them
of this new cause of anxiety. They didn’t shut their eyes of a night,
waiting behind the door for their brother, sometimes until very late,
trembling with cold and terror, while he went singing up and down the
streets with Rocco Spatu and the rest of the gang, and the poor girls
seemed to hear the cries and the shots as they had heard them that night
when there was the talk of hunting two-legged quail.
“You go to bed, and to sleep,” said Mena to her sister; “you are too
young for such things as this.”
To her grandfather she said nothing, for she wished to spare him this
fresh trouble, but to ’Ntoni, when she saw him a little more quiet
than usual, sitting at the door with his chin upon his hands, she took
courage to say: “What are you doing, going about with Rocco Spatu and
Cinghialen-ta? You have been seen with them at the Rotolo and on the
downs. And beware of Goosefoot. Remember how Jesus said to John, ‘Beware
of them whom God has marked.’”
“Who told you that?” said ’Ntoni, leaping up as if he were possessed.
“Tell me who told you.”
“Don Michele told me,” she answered, with tearful eyes. “He told me that
you should beware of Goosefoot, and that to catch the smugglers they had
to get information from some one of the gang.”
“He told you nothing else?”
“No, he told me nothing else.”
Then ’Ntoni swore that there wasn’t a word of truth in the whole of
it, and told her she mustn’t tell his grandfather. Then he got up and
went off in a hurry to the tavern to drown his worries in wine, and if
he met any of the fellows in uniform he gave them a wide berth. After
all, Don Michele really knew nothing about it, and only talked at random
to frighten him because he was jealous about San-tuzza, who had turned
him (Don Michele) out of the house like a mangy dog. And, in short, he
wasn’t afraid either of Don Michele or of any of his crew, that were
paid to suck the blood of the people. A fine thing, to be sure! Don
Michele had no need to help himself in that fashion, fat and sleek as he
was, and he must needs try to lay hands on some poor helpless devil
or other if he tried to get hold of a stray five-franc piece. And that
other idea, too, that to get anything in from outside the country one
must pay the duty, as if the things had been stolen! And Don Michele and
his spies must come poking their noses into it. They were free to take
whatever they liked, and were paid for doing it; but others, if they
tried at the risk of their lives to get their goods on shore, were
treated worse than thieves, and shot down like wolves with pistols and
carbines. But it never was a sin to rob thieves. Don Giammaria said so
himself in the druggist’s shop. And Don Franco nodded, beard and all,
and sneered that when they got a republic there would be no more such
dirty work as that.
“Nor of those devil’s officials,” added the vicar.
“A lot of idle fellows who are paid for carrying guns about!” snarled
the druggist, “like the priests, who take forty centimes for saying
a mass. Tell us, Don Giammaria, how much capital do you put into the
masses that you get paid for?”
“About as much as you put into that dirty water that you make us pay the
eyes out of our heads for,” said the priest, foaming at the mouth.
Don Franco had learned to laugh like Don Silvestro, just on purpose to
put Don Giammaria into a passion; and he went on, without listening to
him:
“Yes, in half an hour their work is done, and they can amuse themselves
for the rest of the day, just the same as Don Michele, who goes flitting
about like a great ugly bird all day long, now that he doesn’t keep the
benches warm at Santuzza’s any more.”
“For that, he has taken it up with me,” interposed ’Ntoni; “and he is
as cross as a bear, and goes swaggering about, because he has a sabre
tied to him. But, by Our Lady’s blood! one time or another, I’ll beat
it about his head, that sabre of his, to show him how much I care for it
and for him.’
“Bravo!” exclaimed the druggist. “That’s the way to talk! The people
ought to show their teeth. But not here; I don’t want a fuss in my shop.
The Government would give anything to get me into a scrape, but I don’t
care to have anything to do with their judges and tribunals and the rest
of their machinery.”
’Ntoni Malavoglia raised his fist in the air, and swore that he was
going to have done with it, once for all, if he went to the galleys for
it--for the matter of that, he had nothing to lose. Santuzza no longer
looked upon him as she formerly did, so much had her father obtained
of her, always whining and wheedling at her between one Ave Maria and
another, since Master Filippo had left off keeping his wine in their
cellar. He said that the customers were thinning off like flies at Saint
Andrew’s Day, now they no longer found Master Filippo’s wine, which they
had drunk ever since they were babies. Uncle Santoro kept on saying
to his daughter: “What do you want with that great useless ’Ntoni
Malavoglia always about the place? Don’t you see that he is eating you
out of house and home, to no purpose? You fatten him like a pig, and
then he goes off and makes eyes at Vespa or the Mangiacarubbe, now that
they are rich;” or he said, “Your customers are leaving you because you
always have ’Ntoni after you, so that nobody has a chance to laugh
or talk with you or, He’s so dirty and ragged that he is a shame to be
seen; the place looks like a stable, and people don’t want to drink out
of the glasses after him. Don Michele looked well at the door, with his
cap with the gold braid. People like to drink their wine in peace when
they have paid for it, and they like to see a man with a sabre at the
door, and everybody took off their caps to him, and nobody was likely to
deny a debt to you while he was about. Now that he doesn’t come, Master
Filippo doesn’t come either. The other day he was passing, and I wanted
him to come in, but he said it was of no use now, for he couldn’t get
anything in contraband any longer, now you had quarrelled with Don
Michele--which is neither good for the soul nor for the body. People
are beginning to murmur already, and to say that the charity you give to
’Ntoni is not blameless, and if it goes on the vicar may hear of it,
and you may lose your medal.”
At first Santuzza held out, for, as she said, she was determined to be
mistress in her own house; but afterwards she began to see things in
another light, and no longer treated ’Ntoni as she used to do. If
there was anything left at meals she did not give it to him, and she
left the glasses dirty, and gave him no wine; so that at last he began
to look cross, and then she told him that she didn’t want any idle
fellows about the place, and that she and her father earned their bread,
and that he ought to do the same. Couldn’t he help a bit about the
house, chopping wood or blowing up the fire, instead of always shouting
and screaming about, or sleeping with his head on his arms, or else
spitting about everywhere so that one didn’t know where to set one’s
foot? ’Ntoni for a while did chop the wood, or blew the fire, which
he preferred, as it was easier work. But he found it hard to work like
a dog, worse than he did at home, and be treated like a dog into the
bargain, with hard words and cross looks--and all for the sake of the
dirty plates they gave him to lick.
At last, one day when Santuzza had just come back from confession, he
made a scene, complaining that Don Michele had begun to hover about the
house again, and that he had waited for her in the piazza when she came
home from church, and that Uncle Santoro had called to him when he
heard his voice as he was passing, and had followed him as far as Vanni
Pizzuti’s shop, feeling the walls with his stick. Santuzza flew into
a passion, and said that he had come on purpose to bring her into sin
again, and make her lose her communion.
“If you are not pleased you can go,” she said. “Did I say anything when
I saw you running after Vespa and the Mangiacarubbe, now that they have
got themselves married?”
But ’Ntoni swore there wasn’t a word of truth in it, that he didn’t go
running after any women, and that she might spit in his face if she saw
him speaking to either of them.
“No, you won’t get rid of him that way,” said Uncle Santoro. “Don’t you
see that he won’t leave you because he lives at your expense? You won’t
get him out unless you kick him out. Master Filippo has told me that he
can’t keep his new wine any longer in the barrels, and that he won’t
let you have it unless you make it up with Don Michele, and help him to
smuggle it in as he used to do.” And he went off after Master Filippo to
Vanni Pizzuti’s shop, feeling his way along the walls with his stick.
His daughter put on haughty airs, protesting that she never would
forgive Don Michele after the ugly trick he had played her.
“Let me manage it,” said Uncle Santoro. “I assure you I can be discreet
enough about it. Don’t believe I will ever let you go back and lick Don
Michele’s boots. Am I your father, or not?”
’Ntoni, since Santuzza had begun to be rude to him, was obliged to
look somewhere else for his dinner, for he was ashamed to go home--where
all the time his people were thinking of him with every mouthful they
ate, feeling almost as if he were dead too; and they did not even spread
the cloth any more, but sat scattered about the room with the plates on
their knees.
“This is the last blow for me, in my old age,” said his grandfather, and
those who saw him pass, bent down with the nets on his shoulders, on his
way to his day’s work, said to each other:
“This is Padron ’Ntoni’s last winter. It will not be long before those
orphans are left quite alone in the world.”
And Lia, when Mena told her to stay in the house when Don Michele passed
by, answered, with a pout: “Yes, it is worth while staying in the house,
for such precious persons as we are! You needn’t be afraid anybody ‘ll
want to steal us.”
“Oh, if your mother were here you wouldn’t talk in that way,” murmured
Mena.
“If my mother were here I shouldn’t be an orphan, and shouldn’t have to
take care of myself. Nor would ’Ntoni go wandering about the streets,
until it is a shame to hear one’s self called his sister. And not a soul
would think of taking ’Ntoni Malavoglia’s sister for a wife.”
’Ntoni, now that he was in bad luck, was not ashamed to show himself
everywhere with Rocco Spatu, and with Cinghialenta, on the downs and by
the Rotolo, and was seen whispering to them mysteriously, like a lot of
wolves. Don Michele came back to Mena, saying, “Your brother will play
you an ugly trick some day, Cousin Mena.” Mena was driven to going out
to look for her brother on the downs, or towards the Rotolo, or at the
door of the tavern, sobbing and crying, and pulling him by the sleeve.
But he replied:
“No, it is all Don Michele; he is determined to ruin me, I tell you.
He is always plotting against me with Uncle Santoro. I have heard them
myself in Pizzuti’s shop; and that spy said to him, ‘And if I come back
to your daughter, what kind of a figure shall I cut?’ And Uncle Santoro
answered, ‘But when I tell you that the whole place will by that time be
dying of envy of you?’”
“But what do you mean to do?” asked Mena, with her pale face. “Think of
our mother, ’Ntoni, and of us who have no one left in the world!”
“Nothing! I mean to put Santuzza to shame, and him too, as they go to
the mass, before all the world. I mean to tell them what I think of
them, and make them a laughing-stock for everybody. I fear nobody in the
world. And the druggist himself shall hear me.”
In short, it was useless for Mena to weep or to beg. He went on saying
that he had nothing to lose, and the others should look after themselves
and not blame him; that he was tired of that life, and meant to end it,
as Don Franco said. And since he was not kindly received at the tavern,
he took to lounging about the piazza, especially on Sundays, and sat
on the church-steps to see what sort of a face those shameless wretches
would wear, trying to deceive not only the world, but Our Lord and the
Madonna under their very eyes.
Santuzza, not wishing to meet ’Ntoni, went to Aci Castello to mass
early in the morning, not to be led into temptation. ’Ntoni watched
the Mangia-carubbe, with her face wrapped in her mantle, not looking to
the right or to the left, now she had caught a husband. Vespa, all over
flounces, and with a very big rosary, went to besiege Heaven that she
might be delivered from her scourge of a husband, and ’Ntoni snarled
after them: “Now that they have caught husbands, they want nothing more.
They’ve somebody to see that they have plenty to eat.” Uncle Crucifix
had lost even his devotional habits since he had got Vespa on his
shoulders; he kept away from church, to be free from her presence at
least for so long a time, to the great peril of his soul.
“This is my last year!” he whined. And now he was always running after
Padron ’Ntoni and the others who were badly off. “This year I shall
have hail in my vineyard, you’ll see; I shall not have a drop of wine!”
“You know, Uncle Crucifix,” replied Padron ’Ntoni, “as soon as you
like, I am ready to go to the notary for that affair of the house, and I
have the money here.”
That one cared for nothing but his house, and other people’s affairs
were nothing to him.
“Don’t talk to me of the notary, Padron ’Ntoni. If I hear any one
speak of a notary I am reminded of the day when I let Vespa drag me
before one. Cursed be that day!”
But Cousin Goosefoot, who smelled a bargain, said to him, “That witch
of a Wasp, after your death, may be capable of selling the house by the
medlar for next to nothing; isn’t it better that you should finish up
your own affairs while you can?” And Uncle Crucifix would reply: “Yes,
yes, I’ll go to the notary; but you must let me make some profit on the
affair. Look how many losses I have had!” And Goosefoot, feigning to
agree with him, would add, “That witch of a wife of yours must not know
that you have the money, or she might twist your neck for the sake of
spending it in necklaces and new gowns.” And he went on: “At least
the Mangiacarubbe does not throw her money away, now she has caught a
husband. Look how she comes to church in a cotton gown!”
“I don’t care for the Mangiacarubbe; but I know she and all the other
women ought to be burned alive. They are only put in the world for our
damnation. Do you believe that she doesn’t spend the money? That’s all
put on to take in Padron Fortunato, who goes about declaring that he’d
rather marry a girl himself out of the street than let his money go to
that beggar, who has stolen his son from him. I’d give him Vespa, for my
part, if he wanted her! They’re all alike! And woe to whoever gets one
for his misfortune! The Lord help him! Look at Don Michele, who goes up
and down the black street after Donna Rosolina! What does he need more,
that one? Respected, well paid, fat, and comfortable! Well, he goes
running after a woman, looking for trouble with a lantern, for the sake
of the vicar’s few soldi after his death!”
“No, he doesn’t go for Donna Rosolina, no,” said Goosefoot, winking
mysteriously. “Donna Rosolina may take root on her terrace among her
tomatoes, with her eyes like a dead fish’s. Don Michele doesn’t care for
the vicar’s money. I know what he goes to the black street for.”
“Then, what will you take for the house?” asked Padron ’Ntoni,
returning to the subject.
“We’ll see, we’ll see when we go to the notary,” replied old Crucifix.
“Now let me listen to the blessed mass;” and so he sent him off for that
time.
“Don Michele has something else in his head,” repeated Goosefoot,
running his tongue out behind Padron ’Ntoni’s back, and making a sign
towards his grandson, who was leaning against the wall, with a ragged
jacket over one shoulder, and casting furious looks at Uncle Santoro,
who had taken to coming to mass to hold out his hand to the faithful in
the intervals of muttered Glorias and Ave Marias, knowing them all very
well as they passed him on their way out, saying to one, “The Lord bless
you;” to another, “God give you health;” and as Don Michele passed,
he said to him, “Go to her, she is waiting for you in the garden. Holy
Mary, pray for us! Lord be merciful to me a sinner!” When Don Michele
began to go back to the tavern people said: “Look if the cat and
dog haven’t made friends! There must have been some reason for their
quarrelling. And Master Filippo has gone back too. He seems to have been
fonder of Don Michele than of Santuzza! Some people wouldn’t care to be
alone, even in Paradise.”
Then ’Ntoni Malavoglia was furious, finding himself hustled out of the
tavern worse than a mangy dog, without even a penny in his pocket to pay
to go and drink in spite of Don Michele and his mustaches, and sit
there all day long for the sake of plaguing them, with his elbows on the
table. Instead of which he was obliged to spend the day in the street,
like a dog with his tail between his legs and his nose to the ground,
muttering, “Blood of Judas! one day there’ll be an upsetting there, that
there will.”
Rocco Spatu and Cinghialenta, who always had more or less money, laughed
in his face from the door of the tavern, pointing their fingers at him,
or came out to talk to him in low tones, pulling him by the arm in the
direction of the downs, or whispering in his ear. He hesitated always
about giving them an answer, like a fool as he was. Then they would
come down upon him both at once. “You deserve to die of hunger, there in
sight of the door, and to have us sneering at you worse than Don Michele
does, you faint-hearted wretch, you!”
“Blood of Judas! don’t talk like that,” cried ’Ntoni, shaking his
fist in the air; “or else some day something new will happen, that there
will!”
But the others went sneering off and left him, until at last they
succeeded in putting him into such a fury that he came straight into the
middle of the tavern among them all, pale as a corpse, with his hand
on his hip, and on his shoulder his old worn jacket, which he wore as
proudly as if it had been a velvet coat, turning his blazing eyes about
the room, looking out for somebody. Don Michele, out of respect for his
own uniform, pretended not to see him, and made as if he would go away;
but ’Ntoni, seeing that Don Michele was not in the humor for fighting,
became outrageously insolent, sneering at him and at Santuzza, and
spitting out the wine which he drank, swearing that it was poison, and
baptized besides, for Santuzza had mixed it with water, and they were
simply fools to go into such a place as that to throw away their money;
and that was the reason why he had left off coming there. Santuzza,
touched in her weakest point, could no longer command her temper, and
flew out at him, saying that he didn’t come because they wouldn’t have
him, that they were tired of keeping him for charity, and they had had
to use the broom-handle to him before he’d go, a great hungry dog!
And ’Ntoni began to rage and storm, roaring and flinging the glasses
about, which, he said, they had put out to catch that other great
codfish in uniform, but he would bring his wine out at his nose for him;
he wasn’t afraid of anybody.
Don Michele, white with rage, with his cap on one side, stammered,
“This will end badly, will end badly!” while Santuzza rained flasks and
glasses upon both of them. At last they flew at each other with their
fists, until they both rolled on the floor like two dogs, and the others
went at them with kicks and thumps trying to part them, which at last
Peppi Naso, the butcher, succeeded in doing by dint of lashing them with
the leather strap which he took off his trousers, which took the skin
off wherever it touched.
Don Michele brushed off his uniform, picked up his sabre, which he had
lost in the scuffle, and went out, only muttering something between his
teeth, for his uniform’s sake. But ’Ntoni Malavoglia, with the
blood streaming from his nose, called out a lot of bad names after
him--rubbing his nose with his sleeve meanwhile, and swearing that he
would soon give him the rest of it.