On, and on. Now the sun was setting, and from the height they had attained they could make out the sea, a bluish circle, bounded by the horizon. Finally, beyond a thick-growing ma.s.s of trees and bushes so st.u.r.dy as to withstand alike the wild winter blasts and the scorching heats of summer, lying in the midst of the melancholy uplands like an island in a sea of light and solitude, they descried their own village, the eyrie of a strong, handsome, and primitive people; shepherds for the most part, or peasants occupied in raising grain and honey.

Green, rocky pastures, gay in the springtime with daffodils, and fragrant with mint and thyme, and fields of grain, hemmed in the little group of slate-stone cottages that gleamed in the sun like burnished silver. Here and there a good-sized tree cast its shadow athwart this quail's nest, hidden away, as it were, amid the billows of ripening grain. Lines of green tamarisks, and a wilderness of thyme and arbute, lay beyond. Further still were the limitless stretches of the uplands, and above all spread a sky of indescribable softness and beauty. On the right, against this sky, the lonely mountain-peaks reared themselves like a company of sphinxes, blue in the morning, lilac at noonday, and purple or bronze-coloured at evening; their rugged sides covered with forests, the home of eagles and vultures.

It was nearly dark when the Eras at last reached the village. Mount Bellu, the colossus of that company of sphinxes, had enveloped itself in a cloak of purple mist, and stood out against the pale, grey sky. The street was already silent and deserted, and the clatter of the horse's hoofs on the rough stone paving resounded like the blows of a hammer.

One after another their companions turned off, so that when they reached their own home, the two women were quite alone.

The Era cottage stood on a little flat clearing, above the level of the street. Higher up on the hillside, overlooking it, was another house, a white one. A large almond-tree, growing beside a piece of crumbling wall that extended from one corner of the cottage, overhung the street, which, beyond this point, merged into the open country.

Scattered about on the level stretch of ground between the two houses,--the grey cottage of the Eras and the white dwelling of the Dejases,--beneath the shadow of the almond-tree, lay a quant.i.ty of great boulders, convenient and comfortable resting-places; hence the spot had come to be used by the villagers as a sort of common or place of public resort. Hardly had the horse stopped before the cottage, when Giovanna slid down and, with lagging steps and hanging head, advanced towards a woman,--a relative left in charge during their absence,--who came forward to meet them with the baby in her arms. Taking the child from her, Giovanna clasped it closely to her breast, and began to weep, burying her head on the chubby little shoulder. Her tears were now flowing quietly enough, a feeling of numbness and of utter despair crept over her, and the unhappiness of the preceding months seemed as nothing in comparison with the misery and desolation of the present moment. The baby, hardly yet five months old, had clear, violet eyes, and little, unformed features set in a stiff, red cap with fringe hanging down over the forehead. He recognised his mother, and began pulling with all his strength on the end of her kerchief, kicking both little feet, and crying: "Ah--ah--aah----"

"Malthinu, my little Malthineddu, my sole comfort in all the earth; your daddy is dead," sobbed Giovanna.

The woman, understanding that Costantino had been found guilty, began to cry as well. Suddenly Aunt Bachissia descended swiftly upon them.

Pushing Giovanna into the cottage, she asked the woman to help her unload the horse.

"Are you stark mad, both of you?" she demanded in a low voice. "What need is there to carry on like that, right out here in sight of the white house? I can see the beak of that old G.o.dmother Malthina now. Ah!

she will be delighted when she hears of our bad luck."

"No," said the woman, "she has come several times to ask for news of Costantino, and she always seemed to feel very sorry. She told me she had dreamed that he was condemned to penal servitude."

"Oh, yes! that is the kind of sorrow that an ill-tempered cur feels! I know her! She's a venomous snake, and she can't forgive us. After all,"

she added a few minutes later, walking towards the cottage with the wallet on her back, "she's right; we can't forgive ourselves."

Aunt Martina Dejas was the owner of the white house on the hill, and the mother of that Brontu Dejas whom Giovanna had refused to marry. She was very well off, but a miser, and Aunt Bachissia was quite mistaken in supposing that she hated them. As a fact, the refusal had affected her very little, either one way or the other.

"See here," said Aunt Bachissia, when they had finished unloading the horse. "Will you do me one favour more, Maria Chicca? Will you take back the horse and tell her that Costantino is to get twenty-seven years in prison? Then watch her face."

The woman took hold of the bridle, the animal having been hired from the Dejases, and led it towards the white house.

This house, formerly the property of a merchant who had failed, had been bought at public sale a few years before. It was large and commodious, with a portico in front that gave it an almost seignorial air, but which was used as a promenade by Aunt Martina's chickens and pigs. It was an inappropriate dwelling for rough shepherds like the Dejases, as was shown by its rude furnishings, composed mainly of high clumsy wooden bedsteads, roughly fashioned chests, and heavy chairs and stools. Aunt Martina was seated on the portico, spinning--she could spin even in the dark--when Maria Chicca approached, leading the horse. The house was entirely unlighted, Brontu and the men being off at the sheepfolds, while Aunt Martina never kept a servant. She had other sons and daughters, all married, with whom she lived in a constant state of warfare on account of her miserly habits. Whenever there was any especial stress of work, she got in some of the neighbours to help.

Often Giovanna and her mother were hired in this way, being paid in stale or injured farm produce. The Eras, however, were too poor to refuse anything they could get.

"Well, what was the result?" asked the old woman, laying the spindle and a little ball of flax on the bench beside her. She had a thin, nasal voice; round, light eyes, placed close together; a delicate, aquiline nose, and lips that were still full and red. "You are crying, Maria Chicca. I saw those two poor women arrive, but I was afraid to go and ask, because I dreamed last night that he had been sentenced to penal servitude."

"Ah, no! they have given him twenty-seven years' imprisonment."

Aunt Martina appeared to be disappointed; not, indeed, that she bore Costantino any ill-will, but because she had a firm belief in the infallibility of her dreams.

She took the horse by the bridle, saying:

"I will go to the Eras' this evening, if I possibly can, but I'm not sure. There's a man coming, he who worked for Basile Ledda; he is going to hire out to us. He was one of the witnesses; but I believe he's back, isn't he?"

"Yes, I think he is," said the other. And, returning to the cottage, she began at once to relate how Aunt Martina felt very sorry; and how she had dreamed that Costantino had got penal servitude; and that Giacobbe Dejas--he was a poor relation of the other Dejases--was going to work for them. Giovanna, who was nursing the child, and gazing down at it sorrowfully, did not so much as raise her eyes. Aunt Bachissia, on the contrary, asked innumerable questions: Had she found the old Dejas alone? Was she spinning,--spinning there in the dark?--etc., etc.

"Listen," she said to Giovanna. "She may be here this evening."

Giovanna neither moved nor looked up.

"My soul! do you hear me?" cried the mother angrily. "She may come down this evening."

"Who?" asked Giovanna, in the tone of a person just awake.

"Malthina Dejas!"

"Well, let her go to the devil!"

"Who is to go to the devil?" asked a sonorous voice from the doorway. It was Isidoro Pane, an old leech-fisher related to the Eras. He had come on a visit of condolence. Tall, with blue eyes and a yellow beard, a bone rosary about his waist, and clasping a long staff with a bundle fastened to the top, Uncle Isidoro looked like a pilgrim. He was the poorest and the gentlest and the most peaceable inhabitant of Orlei. When he wanted to swear, all he said was: "May you become a leech-fisher!" He and Costantino were great friends. Often and often had the two sung the holy lauds in church together, and the Eras had named him as a witness for the defence, because no one could testify better than he to the blameless character of the accused man. His name had, however, been rejected. What, indeed, would the testimony of a poor leech-fisher amount to when confronted with the majesty of the law!

The moment she saw him, Giovanna gave way and began to sob.

"The will of G.o.d be done!" said Isidoro, leaning his staff against the wall. "Be patient, Giovanna Era, you must not lose your trust in G.o.d."

"You know?" asked Giovanna.

"Yes, I have heard. Well, he is innocent. And I tell you that even though he has been condemned to-day, to-morrow his innocence may be proved."

"Ah! Uncle Isidoro," said Giovanna, shaking her head. "Your confidence doesn't impress me any longer. Up to yesterday I believed in you, but now I have lost faith."

"You are not a good Christian; this is Bachissia Era's doing."

Aunt Bachissia, who regarded the fisherman with scant favour, and was always afraid of his bringing vermin into the house, turned on him angrily, and was about to launch forth into abuse, when another visitor arrived. He was presently followed by others, and still others, until at last the little cottage was filled with condoling neighbours; while Giovanna, who was really tired by this time even of weeping, felt it inc.u.mbent upon her to continue to sob and lament desperately.

All the time, Aunt Bachissia kept watching for the rich neighbour, but she did not appear. Instead, there came Giacobbe Dejas, the man who was about to enter her service. He was a cheerful soul, about fifty years old; ordinary-looking, short, thin, smooth-shaven, and bald; with no eyebrows, and a decided squint; the eyes, small and cunning, were of a nondescript colour, something between yellow and green. He had worked for Basile Ledda for twenty years, and had been called as a witness for the defence. In his testimony he had alluded to the ill-treatment Costantino had received from his uncle, but told also how the old miser had maltreated every one, his women and servants as well. Why, the very day before his death he had struck and kicked him--Giacobbe Dejas!

"Malthina Dejas is expecting you," said Aunt Bachissia. "You had better go on up there."

"The devil cut off her nose!" replied Giacobbe. "I'll go presently. What I'm afraid of is of falling out of the frying-pan into the fire! She's a worse miser than even _he_ was."

"If she pays you what you earn, you've no right to judge her," said the ringing voice of Uncle Isidoro.

"Ah! you are there, are you?" said Giacobbe mockingly. "How are the legs? Pretty well punctured?"

Isidoro regarded his legs, which were wrapped about with bits of rag. It was his habit to stand in stagnant water until the leeches attached themselves to him.

"That need not concern you," he answered quietly. "But it is not well to curse the woman whose bread you are going to eat."

"I shall eat my own bread, not hers, and that is our affair. Come now, Giovanna, take heart! What the devil! Do you remember that story I was telling you on the road from Nuoro? Be sensible now, for this little chap's sake. Costantino is not going to die in prison, I can tell you that myself. Give me the baby," he added, stooping down to take it, but finding the little fellow asleep, he straightened himself, and, placing a finger on his lips, "Aunt Bachissia," he said (he always used the "Aunt" and "Uncle" even with people younger than himself), "do me a favour; send your daughter to bed; she has come to the end of her forces. And you, good people," he continued, turning to the company, "let us do something as well, let us take ourselves off."

One by one, accordingly, they all departed. Aunt Bachissia, seizing the stool upon which Isidoro Pane had been seated, took it outside and wiped it vigorously. When she came in she found Giovanna fallen into a sort of a doze, and had to shake her in order to arouse her.

The young woman opened her eyes, which were red and gla.s.sy; then she got up with the child in her arms.

"Go to bed," commanded the mother.

She looked at the door, murmuring: "Never again! He will never, never come back again! For a moment I thought I was waiting for him."

"Go to bed, go to bed," said the mother, her voice harsher than ever.

She gave Giovanna a push, and then, taking up the old bra.s.s candlestick, opened the door.