It was the month of May, and the wild valley of the Isalle, usually so
forbidding and rugged, lay smiling in the sun, adorned with tall grass
and clumps of flowering shrubs and fields of barley, which rippled in
the breeze like cloths of greenish gold. It was as though some old
pagan, drunk with sunlight and sweet scents, had decked himself out in
branches and garlands.
The clear, liquid note of a wild bird would occasionally pierce the
silence of the valley, then die away, drowned in the fragrance of the
narcissuses and flowering broom, which gleamed like nuggets of molten
gold on the very edges of the loftiest cliffs, as though peeping over to
see what lay in the ravine below.
A spendthrift fay had passed along, scattering flowers, colours, scents,
with a reckless hand. Some meadows in the distance, pranked with
ranunculuses, looked like stretches of green water reflecting a starry
sky. Here and there a group of trees nodded and whispered together in
the breeze. The sun had but just sunk and the west was still glowing
like the cheek of a ripe peach; while in the east the mountains lay like
a huge parure of precious stones set in a case of lilac satin.
Costantino Ledda, liberated only a few hours before at Nuoro, was
returning to his native village on foot, descending leisurely into the
valley, his small canvas pack slung on his back. Now and then he would
stop and look around him curiously.
"Ha! the valley seems smaller, perhaps because I have seen the sea," he
murmured.
He looked older; his face was clean-shaven and intensely white; but
otherwise he had none of the tragic air which would have been
appropriate under the circumstances. He was coming back in this
manner,--alone and on foot,--because he had not been able to say
precisely what day he would be freed; otherwise some one, relative or
friend, would certainly have gone to meet him. Besides, his impatience
to reach home would brook no delay. Down and down the mountain-side he
went; he was almost gay, possibly because of some wine he had drunk at
Nuoro, where he had also provided himself with more for the journey. As
he continued to descend his legs would occasionally double up under him,
but he cared little for so trifling an inconvenience as that.
"Why," he said to himself, "when I am tired I have only to lie down and
go to sleep. I have plenty of bread and wine in my bag; what more could
any one want? I'm as free as the birds of the air. Yes, that's true; I
am free; I'm a bachelor now; that's a funny thing; once I was a married
man with a wife, and now I'm a bachelor." He thought that he found this
idea amusing.
Down and down, now watching the sandy path, winding between high grass
on either side, now gazing at the birds to whom he had compared himself,
as they flew hither and thither, at times almost skimming the ground,
then darting into the bushes where they would find a roosting-place for
the night. He thought of the prison magpie, and felt a sudden tightening
at his heart. Yes; it was true he had been sorry, when the time came to
leave that place of torment--the companions whom he disliked so
heartily, the horrible, enclosing walls, the strip of sky that for all
those years had seemed to overhang the prison courtyard like a metal
lid.
After the death of the real culprit days and months had elapsed before
Justice had completed its leisurely formalities and the innocent man
could be liberated. During these months Costantino, informed of the
event, had been wild with impatience, and the days had seemed like
years; yet, when the moment of departure actually came, he nearly wept.
This emotion, however, which was apparently the outcome of pity and
sympathy for the beings whom he was leaving behind, was, in reality,
for the things he was leaving behind; for all those inanimate objects
that had engulfed and swallowed up his life--both his past and his
future. Now this sorrow was done with, everything was done with; even
that horrible torture that followed Giovanna's act was all so much a
thing of the past that he really fancied that he could laugh at it.
Down, and down; he reached the bottom of the valley and began to skirt
the edge of the Isalle. The sunset sky was still bright, and here and
there the water shone between the oleanders and rushes, or reflected the
rose and yellow lights in the sky. The delicate lace umbrellas of the
elder-flower, and the brilliant coral blossoms of the oleanders stood
out in the clear atmosphere as though from a setting of silver.
Costantino, by this time very tired, began to think that perhaps the
valley was not, after all, so small as it had seemed at first.
"I can sleep out of doors perfectly well," he thought, "but it would
have been so amusing to walk up to Isidoro's door--Bang, bang--'Who's
there?' 'I'--'Who's I?' 'Why, Costantino Ledda!' How astonished old
Isidoro would look! Perhaps he would be singing the lauds; may be
_those_ lauds, who knows? Why, let's see! _I_ wrote a set of lauds once!
How extraordinary that seems!"
He wondered over many incidents of the past as a boy will sometimes be
astonished to think of things he did as a child. But the present held
many surprises as well. The glory of the springtide amazed him, as did
the length of time it took to cross a valley that appeared to be so
small. But most of all he wondered to think that he was crossing it on
his way back to his own village.
He was walking now between two fields of grain above which the slanting
light threw a veil of golden haze, and its surface, rippled by the
breeze, seemed stroked by an invisible hand.
He went on picturing his arrival, Isidoro having written to ask him to
come straight to his house: "'Come in,' he will say, and then, 'Giacobbe
Dejas is dead; it was he who did it!'--'I know that already. The devil!
Is that all you have to tell me?' 'Well, then, your wife has married
some one else.' 'I know that too.' 'Then why don't you cry?' 'Why on
earth should I? I have cried enough; I don't want to any more now. I've
crossed the sea; I've seen the world. I'm not a boy any longer; nothing
makes much difference to me any more.'" But at the very moment when he
was boasting to himself of his indifference and worldly cynicism, an icy
grip closed about his heart.
Oh! to be going back to find the little house, Giovanna, his child, his
past!
"There is nothing left," he said aloud. "The storm has swept over it and
carried everything away, everything, everything----"
He threw himself down on the edge of the field of grain in an agony of
grief. It was often this way; the great tempest of sorrow had broken
over him long before and seemingly passed on; but instead of that it had
only hidden itself for a time; it was there now, stealing along, keeping
pace with him; for long distances he would not see its evil shape; then
suddenly it would leap forth, bursting through the ground at his very
feet and whirling around its victim, clutch him by the throat, beat him
to the ground, suffocate him--then leave him spent, exhausted.
After a while Costantino sat up, unfastened his wallet, and drew out a
dried gourd filled with wine, throwing his head back, he took a deep
draught; then he put it away, and sat looking around him at the sea of
grain on whose golden-green surface floated splotches of crimson
poppies. Somewhat revived he presently resumed his journey, but all the
eagerness and spring with which he had set out had died away. What did
it matter whether he got home this day or the next, since there was no
one to expect him? And so he plodded on till the first shadows of
approaching night overtook him just as he reached the end of the valley.
The crickets had turned out like a tribe of mowers with their tiny
silver sickles, the scent of the shrubs and flowers hung heavy in the
warm air; the breeze had died away, and the birds were silent; but the
black triangles of the bats circled swiftly in the luminous grey dusk.
Oh, that divine melancholy of a spring evening! Felt even by happy
souls, may it not be an inherited homesickness, transmitted through all
the ages? A longing for the flowers, and perfumes, and joys of that
eternal, albeit earthly, paradise which our first parents lost for us
forever.
Costantino tramped on and on: he had passed long years under a brutal
oppression, between infected walls, amid corrupt companions in an
environment whose very air was confined, and now--he was walking in the
open, treading grass and stones under foot! As he ascended the mountain
from the valley below, every step brought more of the horizon into view
and a wider expanse of soft, overhanging sky as boundless as liberty
itself. And yet,--and yet,--never in all those years of imprisonment had
he experienced a sense of such utter hopelessness as that with which he
now saw the shadows fall from those free skies. He was pressing on, but
whither? and why? He had set forth eager, elated, as one hastening to a
place where pleasant things await him. Now he wondered at himself. In
the uncertain twilight he seemed to have lost his way; his journey had
turned out to be vain, abortive. He was trudging on aimlessly; he had no
country, nor home, nor family; he would never reach any destination; he
had gone astray, and was wandering about in a boundless, desert tract,
as grey and cheerless as the sky above him, where the stars were like
camp-fires lighted by solitary travellers who, unknown to one another,
wandered, lost like himself, in the unwished-for and oppressive liberty
of the trackless wilderness.
And yet it was not the actual thought of Giovanna herself that weighed
him down, nor yet his lost happiness, nor the misery that a wholly
undeserved fate had forced upon him; all these things had long ago so
eaten into his soul that they had come to form a part of his very
nature, and he had grown almost to forget them, as one forgets the shirt
he has on his back. Now his grief fastened upon memories of certain
specific objects which had passed out of the setting of his life, and
which he could never recover.
His mind dwelt, for instance, persistently on the little common in front
of Giovanna's cottage, the stones in the old wall where they used to sit
together on summer evenings, and above all on the great, wide bed, where
he would lay himself down beside her after the hard day's work was over.
He felt now as though he might be going home at the close of one of
those long, toilsome days. But now--now--where was he to turn for rest
and ease? Thus, up through the load of unhappiness that bore him down,
all-pervading and indefinable as the fragrance of the wild growth about
him, a sense of physical discomfort forced itself; he was conscious of
hunger and weariness.
Reaching the top of a knoll, he sat down and opened his wallet. Night
had fallen, but the atmosphere was clear and bright; the mountains which
hid the sea on the east were bathed in moonlight, and the Milky Way
spanned the heavens like a white, deserted causeway; in the west a pale,
uncertain reflection hung over the distant sea; a magical aurora
encircled the mountains. The path stood out distinctly, and the round,
compact clumps of bushes might have been a scattered flock of black
sheep. No sound broke the stillness but the mournful hoot of an owl.
Costantino ate and drank; then, stretching himself out on the ground, he
allowed his gaze to wander for a moment along that vast white roadway
that traversed the heavens; then he shut his eyes, and the sense of
bodily comfort, the repose for his tired limbs, and the effect of the
food and drink were such that he became almost cheerful again. Hardly,
however, had his lids closed, when all his prison companions began to
troop before his vision, and he seemed to be seated at work at his
shoemaker's bench. The thought of all the wonderful things he would have
to tell his friends at Orlei then came into his mind, and filled him
with such childish pride that he had an impulse to get up at once and
push on so as to get there without delay.
"Yes, I must get up and go on," he said, and then, "No, I won't; I shall
stay here and go to sleep; I am very sleepy; no, I must get on,"--the
words came confusedly this time. "Isidoro Pane expects me. I shall say,
'What a lot of people I have met! I have seen the sea; I know a man who
is a marshal, Burrai is his name; he's going to get me a position of
shoemaker in the king's household.' Now I am going to get up and
start--start--star----" But he did not. Confused visions flitted across
his brain. The _King of Spades_, astride of a donkey, came riding down
that great white road that stretched across the sky; all at once he
heard him cry out,--once,--twice,--three times. He was calling
Costantino, who, opening his sleepy eyes, shut them again, and then
opened them wide: "Idiot," he muttered; "it's the owl; yes, I'm going
directly; I'm going----" And he fell fast asleep.
When he awoke, the great, shining face of the moon was still high in the
heavens; with its flood of steely light there came a fall of dew.
Enormous shadows, like vast black veils, hung over certain parts of the
mountains, but every crag, every thicket and flower even, stood clearly
out wherever the moonlight fell. The owl still gave his penetrating cry,
sharp and metallic, cutting through the silence like a blade of steel.
Costantino shivered; he was wet with dew, and getting up, he yawned
loudly; the prolonged "Ah--ah-h-h" fairly resounded in the intense
stillness. He scrutinised the heavens to find out the hour. The _Star_,
that is to say, Diana, had not yet lifted her emerald-gold face above
the sea; dawn therefore was still a long way off, and Costantino resumed
his journey, hoping to reach the village before the people should be
about. He did not want to meet the gaze of the curious, and above all
else he dreaded being seen by Giovanna or her mother. He had made up his
mind to avoid them, if possible not even to see them or pass by their
cottage; what good would it do? Everything was over between them.
So he trudged on, and on; now up, now down; along the moonlit
mountain-side. The heaps of slate-stone, the asphodels heavy with dew,
the very rocks themselves, gave out a damp, penetrating odour, and here
and there a rill of water stole in and out between fragrant beds of
pennyroyal. As far away as the eye could reach, blue, vapoury skies
overhung blue, misty mountains, until, in the extreme distance, they met
and melted into one shimmering sea of silver. The man walked on, and on;
his brain yet only half awake, but his body refreshed and active. Now
and then he would take a short-cut, leaping from rock to rock, then
pausing breathless, with straining heart and pulses. In the moon's rays
his limpid eyes showed flecks of silver light.
The further he went the more familiar the way became; now he was
inhaling the wild fragrance of his native soil; he recognised the
melancholy _salti_ sown with barley, the grain not yet turned; the beds
of lentisks, the sparse trees whispering in some passing breath of wind,
like old people murmuring in their sleep; and there, far off, the range
of mighty sphinxes blue in the moonlight; and further still, the flash
of the sea, that sea that he was so proud to have crossed in no matter
what fashion. On reaching the little church of San Francisco he paused,
and, cap in hand, said a prayer, a perfectly honest and sincere one, for
at that moment his freedom gave him a sense of happiness such as he had
not as yet experienced at any time since leaving the prison.
* * * * *
Day had hardly begun to break when Isidoro heard a tapping at his door.
For fifteen--twenty days, for four months, in fact, he had been waiting
for that sound, and he was on his feet before his old heart had started
its mad beating against his breast.
He opened the door; in the dim light he saw, or half saw, a tall figure
not dressed in the costume of the country, but wearing a fustian coat as
hard and stiff as leather, out of which emerged a long, pallid face. He
did not know who it was.
Costantino burst into a harsh laugh, and the fisherman, with a pang,
recognised his friend. Yes, at last; it was Costantino come back, but in
that very first moment he knew it was not the Costantino of other days.
He threw his arms around him, but without kissing him, and his heart
melted into tears.
"Well, you didn't know me, after all," said Costantino, unstrapping his
wallet. "I knew you wouldn't."
Even his voice and accent were strange; and now, after his first
sensations, first of chill and then of pity, Isidoro felt a sort of
diffidence. "What are you dressed that way for?" he asked. "If you had
let me know I would have brought you your clothes to Nuoro, and a horse
too. Did you come all the way on foot?"
"No; San Francisco lent me a horse. What are you about, Uncle Isidoro? I
don't want any coffee. Have you got any brandy?"
The fisherman, who had begun to uncover the fire, got up from his knees,
embarrassed and mortified at having nothing better to offer his guest
than a little coffee.
"I didn't know," he stammered, spreading out his hands, "but just wait a
moment, I'll go right off--you see I expected you, and I didn't expect
you----" And he started for the door.
"Stop; where are you going?" cried the other, seizing hold of him. "I
don't want anything at all. I only said it for a joke. Sit down here."
Isidoro seated himself, and began to look furtively at Costantino;
little by little he grew more at ease with him, and presently passing
his hand over his trousers he asked if he intended to go on dressing
that way. In the early morning light streaming through the open door,
Costantino's face looked worn and grey.
"Yes," he said, with another of those disagreeable laughs, "I am going
on dressing this way. I am going away soon."
"Going away soon! Where to?"
"Oh! I have met so many people," began Costantino, in the tone of one
reciting a lesson. "And I have friends who will help me. What is there
for me to do here, anyhow?"
"Why, shoemaking! Didn't you write to me that that was what you wanted
to do?"
"I know a marshal named Burrai," continued Costantino, who always
thought of the _King of Spades_ as still holding office. "He lives in
Rome now, and he's written me a letter; he's going to get me a position
in the King's household to be shoemaker."
Isidoro looked at him pitifully. "Ah, the poor fellow, he was altogether
different. What made him talk like that, and tell all those foolish
little things when there were such heartrending topics to discuss." Thus
Uncle Isidoro to his own heart.
Pretty soon, however, he began to suspect that Costantino was putting
all this on, and that his apparent indifference was assumed. But why? If
he could not be open and natural with him, with whom could he be?
"Come," said he, "let us talk of other things now; we can discuss all
that later. Really, though, won't you have a little coffee? It would do
you good."
"What do you want to talk about?" asked Costantino drearily. "I knew you
would think it strange that I don't cry, but I've cried until I haven't
the wish to any more. And I am going away; one can't stay in this place
after having crossed the sea--who is that going by?" he asked suddenly,
as the sound of footsteps was heard outside. "I don't want any one to
see me," and he jumped up and shut the door.
When he turned, his whole expression had changed and his features were
working.
"I walked by _there_," he said, his voice sinking lower and lower, "on
my way here. I didn't want to, but somehow I found myself there before I
knew it. How can I--how can I stay here? Tell me--you----"
He clasped both hands to his forehead and shook his head violently;
then, throwing himself at full length on the ground, he writhed and
twisted in an agony of sobs, his whole body shaking with the vehemence
of his grief. He was like a young bull caught and held fast in the
leash, and made to submit to the red-hot iron.
The old fisherman turned deathly white, but made no attempt whatever to
calm him. At last, at last, he recognised his friend.