After the Divorce, Grazia Deledda [the giving tree read aloud .txt] 📗

She turned abruptly, laid one hand on his breast, and with the other began to rain blows that were anything but playful.

“Ah, you want to know⁠—crocodile. You want to know, do you? That’s what brought you in, is it? Go back⁠—enjoy the air, poor, dear little lamb! You want me to tell you? You think it is something about Giovanna Era, eh? And you came in for that, and not to see me?”

“Let go,” he said, seizing her hands. “You hit hard; the devil take you! Yes, that’s what I came in for⁠—well?”

“I shan’t tell you a word, so there!”

“Now, Mattea,” he said gently, “don’t make me angry; you are not ill-natured. See now, I am going off to buy you whatever you want. What shall it be? What would you like to have?”

He was like a child promising to be good if only it can have what it wants. And, in fact, at that moment he did want something; he wanted it badly, and not a nice thing, either. What he wanted was to be told that Brontu had beaten his wife, or that she had met with an accident, or that overwhelming disaster of one sort or another had engulfed the house of Dejas, root and branch. It was, therefore, somewhat disappointing when Mattea, closing one eye, announced that some cattle had been stolen, and that Aunt Martina, on hearing the news, had rushed off like a crazy thing to ascertain the exact extent of the loss. “She will be up at the folds all night, and your wife is all alone⁠—do you understand⁠—alone?”

“Well, what difference does that make to me?”

“Stupid! You can go to see her.⁠—You won’t go? Why, that’s what I came expressly to tell you! Of course you’ll go; I want you to. I’m sorry for you. After all, you are her husband.”

“I’m not. I’m not any one’s husband,” he said, with a shrug. “I thought you would have something very different to tell me. Now⁠—what shall I get you? Beans⁠—milk⁠—bacon⁠—cheese?”

“If you’re not any one’s husband, then marry me,” she said, in a low, unsteady voice, like a person who has been drinking.

Costantino coughed, and spat on the ground.

Instantly a gleam of intelligence shot into her usually dull, expressionless eyes.

“Why do you do that?” she asked sharply. “You think, perhaps, that she is better than I?”

He flushed, and then a heartsick feeling came over him.

“Yes,” he said; “you are worse, or⁠—better than she.”

“What do you say?”

“If you are not lying at this moment, and didn’t come here to lay a trap for me, with this story of her being alone⁠—well, then you are better than she.”

“Why should I lay a trap for you? I’m sorry for you, that’s all. I swear by the memory of my dead, that if you go there this evening you’ll run no risk whatever.”

“Who can believe you, woman, when you don’t respect even the dead?”

Mattea, angry and offended, started to leave the hut; but he held her back.

“A low dog,” she said scornfully. “I take pity on you, and you speak to me like that! What have you to reproach me with? What, I say?” She threw her head back with a certain pride, knitting her brows, and turning upon Costantino a look that was altogether new. He stared back at her for a moment, amazed that a woman of her class should speak in that tone, should hold up her head, and dare to look at him with such an expression. Then he began to laugh.

“I’m off now,” he said, “but I’ll be back in a moment. I’ll get some wine too, even though you don’t drink it. Wait for me here⁠—wait, I say,” he repeated roughly, as she followed him to the door. “Don’t bother me.” She stood still, and he went out, but before he had gone a dozen steps he heard her deep voice calling him back.

Returning, he saw the tip of her nose through the crack of the door, and one eye, regarding him with its habitual look of dull stolidity.

“What do you want, squint-eyed goat?”

“If you are going to her, there is no use in making me wait here.”

“Go to the devil whom you came from!” exclaimed Costantino. “I would as soon think of going to her house as you would of going to church. I say you are to wait!” and he made as if to tweak her nose, but she quickly drew back and shut the door.

Ten minutes later Costantino returned, but his strange guest had disappeared. Thinking that she might be hiding somewhere outside, he looked for her, calling in a low voice and telling her that he had bread and meat and fruit, but in vain; she had taken herself off.

An intense stillness reigned all about the hut. Through the night, now completely fallen, came only the sound of the fig-leaves rustling mysteriously, as though an invisible hand were shaking a piece of stiff silk. Nothing else could be heard, and nothing could be seen, except the stars shining brilliantly in the warm sky.

Costantino felt much aggrieved by Mattea’s defection. As lonely as an outcast dog, what on earth was there for him to do throughout that interminable evening? He was not sleepy, having, in fact, taken a long nap in the afternoon, and he had nowhere to go. He began to eat and drink, talking aloud from time to time in a querulous voice.

“If she imagines that I am coming to see her, she’s green,”⁠—silence⁠—“as green as a rose in springtime. She’s crazy.” Another silence. Then⁠—“Coming to see her! Not I; neither her nor the other one. Mattea is sickening; she seems to be a sort of animal, and that’s all there is about it.”

He swore, and then gave a light, purposeless laugh, such as people give when they are alone. All the while he kept swallowing great gulps of wine, and each time that he emptied his glass he would thrust out his lips