I
_THE HERO_
Already the huge standards of Saint Gonselvo had appeared on the square
and were swaying heavily in the breeze. Those who bore them in their
hands were men of herculean stature, red in the face and with their
necks swollen from effort; and they were playing with them.
After the victory over the Radusani the people of Mascalico celebrated
the feast of September with greater magnificence than ever. A
marvellous passion for religion held all souls. The entire country
sacrificed the recent richness of the corn to the glory of the Patron
Saint. Upon the streets from one window to another the women had
stretched their nuptial coverlets. The men had wreathed with vines
the doorways and heaped up the thresholds with flowers. As the wind
blew along the streets there was everywhere an immense and dazzling
undulation which intoxicated the crowd.
From the church the procession proceeded to wind in and out and to
lengthen out as far as the square. Before the altar, where Saint
Pantaleone had fallen, eight men, privileged souls, were awaiting the
moment for the lifting of the statue of Saint Gonselvo; their names
were: Giovanni Curo, l’Ummalido, Mattala, Vencenzio Guanno, Rocco
di Cenzo, Benedetto Galante, Biagio di Clisci, Giovanni Senzapaura.
They stood in silence, conscious of the dignity of their work, but
with their brains slightly confused. They seemed very strong; had the
burning eye of the fanatic, and wore in their ears, like women, two
circles of gold. From time to time they tested their biceps and wrists
as if to calculate their vigour; or smiled fugitively at one another.
The statue of the Patron Saint was enormous, very heavy, made of hollow
bronze, blackish, with the head and hands of silver.
Mattala cried:
“Ready!”
The people, everywhere, struggled to see. The windows of the church
roared at every gust of the wind. The nave was fumigated with incense
and resin. The sounds of instruments were heard now and then. A kind of
religious fever seized the eight men, in the centre of that turbulence.
They extended their arms to be ready.
Mattala cried:
“One! Two! Three!”
Simultaneously the men made the effort to raise the statue to the
altar. But its weight was overpowering, and the figure swayed to the
left. The men had not yet succeeded in getting a firm grip around the
base. They bent their backs in their endeavour to resist. Biagio di
Clisci and Giovanni Curo, the least strong, lost their hold. The statue
swerved violently to one side. L’Ummalido gave a cry.
“Take care! Take care!” vociferated the spectators on seeing the Patron
Saint so imperilled. From the square came a resounding crash that
drowned all voices.
L’Ummalido had fallen on his knees with his right arm beneath the
bronze. Thus kneeling, he held his two large eyes, full of terror
and pain, fixed on his hand which he could not free, while his mouth
twisted but no longer spoke. Drops of blood sprinkled the altar.
His companions, all together, made a second effort to raise the weight.
The operation was difficult. L’Ummalido, in a spasm of pain, twisted
his mouth. The women spectators shuddered.
At length the statue was lifted and L’Ummalido withdrew his hand,
crushed and bleeding and formless. “Go home, now! Go home!” the people
cried, while pushing him toward the door of the church.
A woman removed her apron and offered it to him for a bandage.
L’Ummalido refused it. He did not speak, but watched a group of men who
were gesticulating and disputing around the statue.
“It is my turn!”
“No!—no! It’s my turn!”
“No! let me!”
Cicco Ponno, Mattia Seafarolo and Tommaso di Clisci were contending for
the place left vacant by L’Ummalido.
He approached the disputants. Holding his bruised hand at his side, and
with the other opening a path, he said simply:
“The position is mine.”
And he placed his left shoulder as a prop for the Patron Saint. He
stifled down his pain, gritting his teeth, with fierce will-power.
Mattala asked him:
“What are you trying to do?”
He answered:
“What Saint Gonselvo wishes me to do.”
And he began to walk with the others. Dumbfounded the people watched
him pass. From time to time, someone, on seeing the wound which was
bleeding and growing black, asked him:
“L’Umma’, what is the matter?”
He did not answer. He moved forward gravely, measuring his steps by
the rhythm of the music, with his mind a little hazy, beneath the vast
coverlets that flapped in the wind and amongst the swelling crowd.
At a street corner he suddenly fell. The Saint stopped an instant and
swayed, in the centre of a momentary confusion, then continued its
progress. Mattia Scafarola supplied the vacant place. Two relations
gathered up the swooning man and carried him to a nearby house.
Anna di Cenzo, who was an old woman, expert at healing wounds, looked
at the formless and bloody member, and then shaking her head, said:
“What can I do with it?”
Her little skill was able to do nothing. L’Ummalido controlled his
feelings and said nothing. He sat down and tranquilly contemplated his
wound. The hand hung limp, forever useless, with the bones ground to
powder.
Two or three aged farmers came to look at it. Each, with a gesture or a
word, expressed the same thought.
L’Ummalido asked:
“Who carried the Saint in my place?”
They answered:
“Mattia Scafarola.”
Again he asked:
“What are they doing now?”
They answered:
“They are singing the vespers.”
The farmers bid him good-bye and left for vespers. A great chiming came
from the mother church.
One of the relations placed near the wound a bucket of cold water,
saying:
“Every little while put your hand in it. We must go. Let us go and
listen to the vespers.”
L’Ummalido remained alone. The chiming increased, while changing its
metre. The light of day began to wane. An olive tree, blown by the
wind, beat its branches against the low window.
L’Ummalido began to bathe his hand little by little. As the blood and
concretions fell away, the injury appeared even greater. L’Ummalido
mused:
“It is entirely useless! It is lost. Saint Gonselvo, I offer it up to
you.”
He took a knife and went out. The streets were deserted. All of the
devotees were in the church. Above the houses sped, like fugitive herds
of cattle, the violet clouds of a September sunset.
In the church the united multitude sang in measured intervals as if
in chorus to the music of the instruments. An intense heat emanated
from the human bodies and the burning tapers. The silver head of Saint
Gonselvo scintillated from on high like a light house. L’Ummalido
entered. To the stupefaction of all, he walked up to the altar and
said, in a clear voice, while holding the knife in his left hand:
“Saint Gonselvo, I offer it up to you.”
And he began to cut around the right wrist, gently, in full sight of
the horrified people. The shapeless hand became detached little by
little amidst the blood. It swung an instant suspended by the last
filaments. Then it fell into a basin of copper which held the money
offerings at the feet of the Patron Saint.
L’Ummalido then raised the bloody stump and repeated in a clear voice:
“Saint Gonselvo, I offer it up to you.”