The sad news passed from mouth to mouth in a flash. The people pressed
around the cart, stretched their necks to see the body, no longer
thought of threats from above, stricken by this new, unexpected
occurrence, invaded by that natural fierce curiosity that men possess
in the presence of blood.
“Is he dead? How did he die?”
Pallura rested supine on the boards, with a large wound in the centre
of his forehead, with an ear lacerated, with rents in his arms, in his
sides, in one thigh. A tepid stream dripped from the hollow of his eyes
down to his chin and neck, while it spotted his shirt, formed black
and shining clots upon his breast, on his leather belt, and even on his
trousers.
Giacobbe remained leaning over the body; all of those around him
waited, a light as of the morning illuminated their perplexed faces;
and, in that moment of silence, from the banks of the river came the
croak of the frogs, and the bats passed and repassed grazing the heads
of the people.
Suddenly Giacobbe standing up, with a cheek stained with blood, cried,
“He is not dead. He still breathes.”
A dull murmur ran through the crowd, and those nearest stretched
themselves to see; the restlessness of those most distant made them
break into shouts. Two women brought a flask of water, another some
strips of linen, while a youth offered a pumpkin full of wine. The
face of the wounded man was bathed, the flow of blood from the forehead
stanched and his head raised.
Then there arose loud voices, demanding the cause of all this. The
hundred pounds of wax were missing; barely a few fragments of candles
remained among the interstices of the boards in the bottom of the cart.
In the midst of the commotion the emotions of the people were kindled
more and more, and became more irritable and belligerent. As an ancient
hereditary hatred for the country of Mascalico, opposite upon the other
bank of the river, was always fermenting, Giacobbe cried venomously in
a hoarse voice, “Maybe the candles are being used for Saint Gonselvo?”
This was like a spark of fire. The spirit of the church awoke suddenly
in that race, grown brutish through so many years of blind and fierce
worship of its one idol. The words of the fanatic sped from mouth to
mouth. And beneath the tragic glow of the twilight this tumultuous
people had the appearance of a tribe of negro mutineers.
The name of the Saint burst from all throats like a war cry. The most
ardent hurled imprecations against the farther side of the river,
while shaking their arms and clenching their fists. Then, all of
those countenances afire with wrath and wrathful thoughts, round and
resolute, whose circles of gold in the ears and thick tufts of hair
on the forehead gave them a strange barbarian aspect, all of those
countenances turned toward the reclining man, and softened with pity.
There was around the cart a pious solicitude shown by the women, who
wished to reanimate the suffering man; many loving hands changed the
strips of linen on the wounds, sprinkled the face with water, placed
the pumpkin of wine to the white lips and made a kind of a pillow
beneath the head.
“Pallura, poor Pallura, why do you not answer?”
He remained motionless, with closed hands, with mouth half open, with
a brown down on his throat and chin, with a sort of beauty of youth
still apparent in his features even though they were strained by the
convulsions of pain. From beneath the binding of his forehead a stream
of blood dropped down upon his temples, while at the angles of his
mouth appeared little bubbles of red foam, and from his throat issued
a species of thick, interrupted hissing. Around him the assistance,
the questions, the feverish glances increased. The mare every so
often shook her head and neighed in the direction of her stable. An
oppression as of an imminent hurricane weighed upon the country.
Then one heard feminine cries in the direction of the square, cries of
the mother, that seemed even louder in the midst of the sudden silence
of the others. An enormous woman, almost suffocated by her flesh,
passed through the crowd, and arrived crying at the cart. As she was
so heavy as to be unable to climb into the cart, she grasped the feet
of her son, with words of love interspersed among her tears, given in
a broken voice, so sharp, and with an expression of grief so terribly
beast like, that a shiver ran through all of the bystanders and all
turned their faces aside.
“Zaccheo! Zaccheo! my heart! my joy!”—the widow cried, over and over
again, while kissing the feet of the wounded one, and drawing him to
her toward the ground. The wounded man stirred, twisted his mouth in
a spasm, opened his eyes wide, but he really could not see, because a
kind of humid film covered his sight. Great tears began to flow from
the corners of his eyelids and to run down upon his cheeks and neck,
his mouth remained twisted, and in the thick hissing of his throat
one perceived a vain effort to speak. They crowded around him. “Speak,
Pallura! Who has wounded you? Who has wounded you? Speak! Speak!”
And beneath the question their wrath raged; their violent desires
intensified, a dull craving for vengeance shook them and that
hereditary hatred boiled up again in the souls of all.
“Speak! Who has wounded you? Tell us about it! Tell us about it!”
The dying man opened his eyes a second time, and as they clasped both
of his hands, perhaps through the warmth of that living contact the
spirit in him revived and his face lighted up. He had upon his lips a
vague murmur, betwixt the foam that rose, suddenly more abundant and
bloody. They did not as yet understand his words. One could hear in the
silence the breathing of the breathless multitude, and all eyes held
within their depths a single flame because all minds awaited a single
word.
“Ma—Ma—Ma—scalico.”
“Mascalico! Mascalico!” howled Giacobbe, who was bending, with strained
ear, to grasp the weak syllables from that dying mouth. An immense
cry greeted this explanation. There was at first a confused rising and
falling as of a tempest in the multitude. Then when one voice raised
above the tumult gave the signal, the multitude disbanded in mad haste.
One single thought pursued those men, one thought that seemed to have
flashed instantaneously into the minds of all: to arm themselves with
something in order to wound. A species of sanguinary fatality settled
upon all consciences beneath the surly splendour of the twilight,
in the midst of the electrifying odours emanating from the panting
country.