I Malavoglia Page 9

  Then zio Crocifisso replied:‘When you talk to me like that, I don’t know what to say,’ and he promised to talk to Piedipapea. ‘I’d make any sacrifice for the sake of friendship.’ Padron ’Ntoni could vouch that he would so such and such a thing, for the sake of friendship; and he offered him his snuff box, patted the baby and gave her a chestnut. ‘Don Silvestro knows my soft spots; I can’t say no. This evening I’ll have a talk with Piedipapera, and tell him to wait until Easter; as long as comare Maruzza sets her mind to it.’ Comare Maruzza didn’t know what she was supposed to set that mind of hers to, but she said she’d set it to it straight away, anyway. ‘Then you can send for those beans you asked me for, and plant them,’ zio Crocifisso said to don Silvestro, before going off.

  ‘Fine, fine,’ said don Silvestro. ‘I know your heart is as big as the sea, for your friends.’

  Piedipapera didn’t want any talk of delay in front of people: and he shrieked and tore his hair, asking whether they wanted to get him into a strait jacket, and to leave him without bread for the winter, him and his wife Grazia, having persuaded him to take over the Malavoglia debt, and he’d said goodbye to five hundred good solid lire that he had taken out of his own mouth in order to give them to zio Crocifisso. His wife Grazia, poor thing, stared in amazement, because she didn’t know where he had got this money from, and put in good words for the Malavoglia, who were decent folk, and everyone in the neighbourhood had always known them as such. Now zio Crocifisso too was taking the Malavoglia’s part. ‘They said they will pay, and if they can’t pay they’ll leave you the house. Gnà Maruzza will set her mind to that too. Don’t you know that in this day and age you have to do what you can to get your just deserts?’ Then Piedipapera threw on his jacket and went off swearing, saying they could do as they wanted, zio Crocifisso and his wife, since he counted as nothing in his own house.

  CHAPTER VII

  That was a bad Christmas for the Malavoglia; at that very same time Luca drew his conscription number, the sort of low number that the poor devil always gets, and he went off to do his soldiering without anyone doing much weeping and wailing, because by now they were used to that sort of bad luck. This time ’Ntoni went with his brother, with his cap low over one ear, so that it seemed as if it were he who was going, and he told him there was nothing to it, and he too had done his military service. That day it was raining, and the road was one great puddle.

  ‘I don’t want you to come with me,’ Luca kept saying to his mother; ‘anyhow the station is a long way away.’ And he stood at the doorway watching it pour down on the medlar tree, with his little bundle under his arm. Then he kissed his grandfather and his mother on the hand, and hugged Mena and the little ones.

  So la Longa watched him go off under the umbrella, and all his relatives with him, jumping over the cobbles of the little street which was one great puddle, and the boy, who was as sensible as his grandfather, had tucked up his trousers on the balcony, although he wouldn’t be wearing them any more, now that they were giving him soldiers clothes.

  ‘This one won’t be writing for money, when he’s away,’ thought the old man; ‘and if God gives him long life, he will set the house by the medlar tree to rights again.’ But God did not give him long life, for the simple reason that he was that sort of person; and when later, the news came that he was dead, la Longa was left with the hurtful memory that she had let him leave in the rain, and hadn’t gone with him to the station.

  ‘Mother,’ said Luca turning round, because it broke his heart to leave her there standing so quietly on the balcony, like Our Lady of Sorrows; ‘when I come back I’ll let you know beforehand, and you can all come and meet me at the station.’ And Maruzza remembered those words until her dying day; and until that same day she carried that other thorn thrust deep into her heart, the fact that her boy hadn’t been present at the rejoicings that went on when they put the Provvidenza to sea again, and the whole village was there, and Barbara Zuppidda had appeared with her broom to sweep away the shavings. ‘I’m doing this for love of you,’ she had told padron ’Ntoni’s ’Ntoni; ‘because it’s your Provvidenza.’

  ‘With that broom in your hand you look like a queen to me,’ replied ’Ntoni. ‘There is no housewife in Trezza to touch you.’

  ‘Now you’re taking away the Provvidenza, you won’t be coming around this way any more, compare ’Ntoni.’

  ‘Oh yes I shall. Anyway, this is the shortest way to the sciara.’

  ‘You’ll come here to see the Mangiacarrubbe girl, because she comes to stand at the window when you pass by.’

  ‘I leave the Mangiacarrubbe girl to Rocco Spatu. I’ve other fish to fry.’

  ‘You must have so many girls to think about, girls from outside the kingdom, haven’t you?’

  ‘There are beautiful girls here too, comare Barbara, as well I know.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Upon my word!’

  ‘What should you care?’

  ‘I do care, most definitely! but they don’t care about me, because they’ve got ladykillers parading under their windows, ladykillers with polished boots!’

  ‘I pay not the slightest heed to polished boots, by the Virgin of Ognina! Mother says polished boots serve no purpose but to eat up our dowry, and everything else besides; and one fine day she wants to come into the street with her spindle in her hand, and have it out with that don Silvestro, if he doesn’t leave me in peace.’

  ‘Do you really mean that, comare Barbara?’

  ‘I do indeed!’

  ‘I’m glad to hear that,’ said ’Ntoni.

  ‘Listen, what about going to the sciara on Monday, when my mother goes to market?’

  ‘On Monday my grandfather won’t let me draw breath, now that we’re putting the Provvidenza to sea again.’

  The moment the mastro Turi had said that the Provvidenza was ready, padron ’Ntoni went to fetch her with his grandsons, and all his friends, and as she went on her way towards the beach, she tottered over the stones as if she were seasick, there amid the crowd.

  ‘Give her here,’ compare Zuppiddo shouted, loudest of all; but the others sweated and shouted as they pushed her on the slipway, when the boat jolted on the stones. ‘Let me do it; or else I’ll take her up in my arms just like that.’

  ‘Compare Turi actually could do just that, with those arms of his,’ some people said. Or: ‘Now the Malavoglia are back in the saddle again.’

  ‘That devil compare Zuppiddo has got magic in his hands,’ they exclaimed. ‘She really did look like an old boot, and see what he’s done with her.’

  And indeed now the Provvidenza seemed a different boat, gleaming with new pitch, and with that fine red stripe round her side, and St Francis on the stern with his beard that looked like cotton wool, so that even la Longa felt more kindly towards the Provvidenza, for the first time since the boat had returned without her husband, and had made peace with her out of fear, now that the bailiff had been.

  ‘Long live St Francis,’ everyone shouted when they saw the Provvidenza go by, and la Locca’s son shouted louder than any of them, because he hoped that now padron ’Ntoni might take him on too by the day. Mena had come out on to the balcony, and was crying once again, this time for joy, and even la Locca got up and went along with the crowd, behind the Malavoglia.

  ‘Oh comare Mena, this must be a fine day for all of you,’ said Alfio Mosca from his window opposite; ‘you must feel as I shall feel when I get my mule!’

  ‘And will you sell your donkey?’

  ‘What else can I do? I’m not rich like Vanni Pizzuto; if I were, in all conscience, I wouldn’t.’

  ‘Poor creature.’

  ‘If I had to feed another mouth, I’d rather take a wife, and not be alone, like a dog,’ said Alfio, laughing.

  Mena didn’t know what to say, and at last Alfio added:

  ‘Now that you’ve got the Provvidenza at sea again, they’ll marry you off to Brasi Cipolla.’

  ‘Grandfather hasn�
�t said anything about it.’

  ‘He will. There’s plenty of time. So many things will happen between now and your marriage, and goodness knows what roads I’ll travel with my cart! They say that there’s work for everyone on the railway beyond the city, on the plain of Catania. Now Santuzza has come to an arrangement with massaro Filippo for the new grape must, and I shan’t have anything to do here.’

  But although the Malavoglia were in the saddle once again, padron Cipolla continued to shake his head, and went round proclaiming that theirs was a horse without legs; he knew where the weak spots were, hidden under the new pitch.

  ‘A patched up Provvidenza,’ sniggered the chemist, ‘syrup of althea and mucilage of gum arabic, stuck together like our constitutional monarchy. You’ll see, they’ll even make padron ’Ntoni pay property tax on her.’

  ‘They’ll make us pay for the very water we drink. Now they say that they’re going to put a tax on pitch. That’s why padron ’Ntoni was in such a hurry to get his boat done; although in fact mastro Turi is still owed fifty lire by him.’

  ‘The only one with any sense is zio Crocifisso, when he sold Piedipapera the credit for the lupins.’

  ‘Now, if the Malavoglia have more bad luck, Piedipapera will take the house by the medlar tree; and the Provvidenza will go back to compare Turi.’

  Meanwhile the Provvidenza had slid into the sea like a duck, with her beak in the water, and was wallowing in it, enjoying the cool, rocking gently in the green sea which slopped around her sides, and the sun danced on her paintwork. Padron ’Ntoni enjoyed the sight too, hands behind his back, and legs apart, frowning slightly as sailors do when they squint against the sun, which was a fine winter sun, and the fields were green, the sea was glittering and the endless sky was deep blue. So the warm sun and the kind winter mornings become so again even for eyes which have wept, and which have found them the colour of pitch; and everything is born anew, like the Provvidenza, and all she needed was a bit of paint and pitch, and a few planks, for her to seem brand new, and the only ones who don’t see anything anew are those eyes which have stopped weeping, and are closed in death.

  ‘Compare Bastianazzo wasn’t here to see this rejoicing,’ Maruzza thought to herself as she went backwards and forwards in front of her loom, arranging the weft threads, because her husband had made the framework and crossbars with his own hands, on Sundays or when it was raining, and he himself had set them there in the wall. Everything in that house still spoke to her of him, and his oil cloth was there in a corner, and his almost new shoes under the bed. While she smeared the threads with size, Mena too felt black at heart, thinking of compare Alfio, who was going off to Bicocca, and was going to sell his donkey, poor beast! because young people have short memories, and eyes which look only towards the dawning day; and it is only the old who look westward, those who have seen the sun set so many times.

  ‘Now that they’ve got the Provvidenza at sea again,’ said Maruzza at last, seeing her daughter looking thoughtful, ‘your grandfather has started to talk to padron Cipolla; I saw them together this morning from the balcony, in front of Peppi Naso’s shed.’

  ‘Padron Fortunato is rich and has nothing to do, and stands in the square all day long,’ replied Mena.

  ‘Yes, and his son Brasi has considerable property. Now that we have our boat, and our men won’t have to go out by the day, we too will be out of the wood; and if the souls in Purgatory help us to repay the lupin debt, we’ll be able to start thinking about other matters. Your grandfather is well aware of things, don’t you worry, and he won’t let you feel you’ve lost a father, because he is like another father to you.’

  Soon afterwards padron ’Ntoni arrived, laden with nets so that he looked like a mountain, and you couldn’t see his face. ‘I went to get them from the fishing boat,’ he said, ‘and we must look at the mesh, because to-morrow we’re going to fit out the Provvidenza.’

  ‘Why didn’t you get ’Ntoni to help you?’ said Maruzza by way of reply, pulling from one side, while the old man turned round in the middle of the courtyard like a wool winder, to unravel the endless nets, and he looked like a snake and its tail. ‘I left him over there, with mastro Pizzuto. Poor boy, he has to work the whole week! And it’s warm even in January with that bit of gear on your shoulders!’

  Alessi laughed at his grandfather, seeing him so red and bent like a fish hook, and his grandfather said to him: ‘Look, that poor Locca is out there; her son is in the square doing nothing, and they haven’t got any food.’ Maruzza sent Alessi to la Locca, with a few beans, and the old man wiped the sweat away with his shirt sleeve and added: ‘Now that we’ve got our boat, if we make it as far as the summer, with God’s help, we’ll repay our debt.’ That was all he could say, and he gazed at his nets, sitting under the medlar tree, as if he saw them all full.

  ‘Now we must stock up with salt, before they put the tax on it, if indeed they’re going to,’ he said with his hands under his armpits. ‘We’ll pay compare Zuppiddo the first money we get because he’s promised to provide me with kegs on credit.’

  ‘There are five onze from Mena’s cloth in the chest of drawers,’ added Maruzza.

  ‘Good! I don’t want any more debt with zio Crocifisso, I couldn’t bring myself to do that after the lupin business; but he could give us thirty lire for the first time we went out to sea with the Provvidenza.’

  ‘You leave him be,’ exclaimed la Longa, ‘zio Crocifisso’s money brings bad luck! I heard the black hen crowing this very night!’

  ‘Poor creature,’ said the old man smiling, as he saw the black hen walking in the courtyard with her tail in the air and her comb over her ear, as if it had nothing to do with her. ‘She lays an egg every day.’

  Then Mena spoke up, standing in the doorway. ‘There’s a basket full of eggs,’ she added, ‘and on Monday, if compare Alfio goes to Catania, you could get him to sell them in the market.’

  ‘Yes, that all helps with the debt,’ said padron ’Ntoni ‘but all of you ought to eat the odd egg, when the mood takes you.’

  ‘Well the mood doesn’t take us,’ replied Maruzza, and Mena added ‘If we eat them, compare Alfio won’t have any to sell in the market; now we’ll put ducks’ eggs under the sitting hen, and the chicks will sell at eight soldi a piece.’ Her grandfather looked her in the eye and told her that she was a real Malavoglia.

  The fowl were flapping in the dust of the courtyard, and the broody hen, all dazed, with her comb drooping, was shaking her beak in a comer; along the wall, more cloth was hanging for bleaching in the sun, under the greenery of the plants in the vegetable patch, weighed down by stones. ‘It all brings in money,’ repeated padron ’Ntoni; ‘and with God’s help, they won’t need to evict us from our own house. ‘East, west, home’s best.’ ’

  ‘Now the Malavoglia will have to pray to God and St Francis for the catch to be good,’ Piedipapera was saying.

  ‘Yes, what with catches as they are,’ exclaimed padron Cipolla, ‘and they seem to have thrown the cholera into the sea for the fish, into the bargain.’

  Compare Mangiacarrubbe nodded, and zio Cola returned to the subject of the salt tax they wanted to introduce, after which the anchovies could relax, with no more fear of the steamboat wheels, because no one would go and fish for them any more.

  ‘And they’ve dreamt up something else,’ added mastro Turi the caulker, ‘a tax on pitch.’ Those who didn’t care about pitch said nothing but Zuppiddo carried on shrieking that he would shut up shop, and anyone who needed their boat caulking would have to use their wife’s chemise as oakum. Then there was a wave of shouting and swearing. At this juncture the engine whistle sounded, and the great railway coaches emerged suddenly out of the slope of the hill from the hole they had made in it, smoking and clamouring like the very devil. ‘Here we go,’ said padron Fortunato; ‘the railway on the one hand and the steamers on the other. Life at Trezza has become impossible, upon my soul!’

  In the village all hell broke lo
ose when they wanted to put a tax on pitch. Zuppidda, foaming at the mouth, went up on to the balcony and began to proclaim that this was another of don Silvestro’s dastardly deeds, since he wanted to ruin the village, because they hadn’t wanted him for a husband for Barbara; neither she nor her daughter even wanted the man in the wedding procession. When comare Venera talked about the husband her daughter would be taking, you would have thought that she herself was the bride. Mastro Turi would shut up shop, she said, but she would like to see how people would manage to get their boats to sea, and they would be reduced to devouring each other for want of bread. Then the neighbourhood women came to their doorsteps with their distaffs in their hands, bawling that they wanted to kill the lot of them, those tax people, and set fire to all their vile papers, and the place where they kept them. As they came back from the sea, the men left their tackle to dry, and stood at the windows to watch the revolution their wives were bringing about.

  ‘All because padron ’Ntoni’s ’Ntoni is back,’ continued comare Venera, ‘and he’s always here, hanging on to my daughter’s apron strings. Now don Silvestro doesn’t like those cuckold’s horns. And if we won’t have him, what can he hope for? My daughter is my affair, and I can give her to whomsoever I please. I gave a clear no to mastro Callà when he came with the message, zio Santoro saw me too. Don Silvestro gets that stooge of a mayor to do anything he wants; but I don’t give a damn about the mayor and his town clerk. Now they are trying to get us to shut up shop all because I won’t let my possessions be grabbed by any Tom, Dick or Harry! What a crowd, eh? why don’t they put a tax on wine, or on meat, since no one eats it? but massaro Filippo wouldn’t like that, out of love for Santuzza, and they’re both in a state of mortal sin, and she wears the scapular of a Daughter of Mary to hide her dirty deeds, and that old cuckold zio Santoro sees nothing. Everyone feathers their own nest, like compare Naso, who’s fatter than his own pigs! Fine councillors we have! Now we’re going to have to make mincemeat of the whole rotten bunch.’