Sicilian Stories

by Giovanni Verga

  In quel tempo era crepato di stenti e di vecchiaia l’asino grigio; e il carrettiere era andato a buttarlo lontano nella sciara. – Così si fa, brontolava Malpelo; gli arnesi che non servono più si buttano lontano. – Ei andava a visitare il carcame del grigio in fondo al burrone, e vi conduceva a forza anche Ranocchio, il quale non avrebbe voluto andarci; e Malpelo gli diceva che a questo mondo bisogna avvezzarsi a vedere in faccia ogni cosa bella o brutta; e stava a

  refused to return to the former one. Two or three days later, they did actually find master Misciu’s body, wearing the trousers, and stretched out face downward, looking as if it were embalmed. “Uncle” Mommu remarked that he must have suffered greatly before dying, because the pillar had bent into an arc over him and had buried him alive; in fact, there still were visible signs that master Animal had instinctively tried to get free by digging in the sand; his hands were torn up, and his nails broken. “Just like his son Nasty Redhead!” the cripple repeated. “He was digging on this end while his son was digging on that end.” But they said nothing to the boy, because they knew him to be vicious and vindictive.

  The carter cleared the passage of the corpse in the same way he used to clear it of fallen sand and dead donkeys, because this time, in addition to the stench from the body, it was a question of “flesh that had been baptized.” The widow shortened the trousers and the shirt, altering them for Nasty Redhead, who thus was dressed for the first time in nearly new clothes. The shoes were stored away until he grew up, because shoes can’t be made smaller, and his sister’s fiancé hadn’t wanted a dead man’s shoes.

  Nasty Redhead smoothed out those nearly new fustian trousers on his legs. They seemed to him as soft and smooth as his father’s hands, which used to caress his hair, rough and red as it was. He kept those shoes hanging from a nail over his straw mattress, as if they had been the Pope’s slippers; on Sundays he’d handle them, polish them, and try them on. Then he’d put them on the floor, one next to the other, and study them for hours at a time, his elbows on his knees and his chin in his palms; who knows what ideas he was ruminating in that wicked brain of his?

  And he did have odd ideas, that Nasty Redhead! Since he had inherited his father’s pick and spade, also, he used them even though they were too heavy for a boy his age; when asked whether he wanted to sell them, at the same price as if they were new, he had refused. His father’s own hands had made their handles that smooth and shiny, and he couldn’t have gotten any others to be smoother or shinier even if he worked at it for a hundred years and then another hundred.

  By that time the gray donkey had died of overwork and old age, and the carter had gone off and dumped him far away on the lava field. “That’s how it goes,” Nasty Redhead grumbled, “the equipment that’s no good anymore is dumped far away.” He’d go to visit Gray’s body at the bottom of the gorge, and he’d force Frog to come along, though he wouldn’t have wanted to go. Nasty Redhead would tell him that, in this world, you must get used to looking everything in the face, whether it was beautiful or

  considerare con l’avida curiosità di un monellaccio i cani che accorrevano da tutte le fattorie dei dintorni a disputarsi le carni del grigio. I cani scappavano guaendo, come comparivano i ragazzi, e si aggiravano ustolando sui greppi dirimpetto, ma il Rosso non lasciava che Ranocchio li scacciasse a sassate. – Vedi quella cagna nera, gli diceva, che non ha paura delle tue sassate; non ha paura perché ha più fame degli altri. Gliele vedi quelle costole! Adesso non soffriva più, l’asino grigio, e se ne stava tranquillo colle quattro zampe distese, e lasciava che i cani si divertissero a vuotargli le occhiaie profonde e a spolpargli le ossa bianche e i denti che gli laceravano le viscere non gli avrebbero fatto piegar la schiena come il più semplice colpo di badile che solevano dargli onde mettergli in corpo un po’ di vigore quando saliva la ripida viuzza. Ecco come vanno le cose! Anche il grigio ha avuto dei colpi di zappa e delle guidalesche, e anch’esso quando piegava sotto il peso e gli mancava il fiato per andare innanzi, aveva di quelle occhiate, mentre lo battevano, che sembrava dicesse: Non più! non più! Ma ora gli occhi se li mangiano i cani, ed esso se ne ride dei colpi e delle guidalesche con quella bocca spolpata e tutta denti. E se non fosse mai nato sarebbe stato meglio.

  La sciara si stendeva malinconica e deserta fin dove giungeva la vista, e saliva e scendeva in picchi e burroni, nera e rugosa, senza un grillo che vi trillasse, o un uccello che vi volasse su. Non si udiva nulla, nemmeno i colpi di piccone di coloro che lavoravano sotterra. E ogni volta Malpelo ripeteva che al di sotto era tutta scavata dalle gallerie, per ogni dove, verso il monte e verso la valle; tanto che una volta un minatore c’era entrato coi capelli neri, e n’era uscito coi capelli bianchi, e un altro cui s’era spenta la torcia aveva invano gridato aiuto ma nessuno poteva udirlo. Egli solo ode le sue stesse grida! diceva, e a quell’idea, sebbene avesse il cuore più duro della sciara, trasaliva.

  – Il padrone mi manda spesso lontano, dove gli altri hanno paura d’andare. Ma io sono Malpelo, e se io non torno più, nessuno mi cercherà.

  Pure, durante le belle notti d’estate, le stelle splendevano lucenti anche sulla sciara, e la campagna circostante era nera anch’essa, come la sciara, ma Malpelo stanco della lunga giornata di lavoro, si sdraiava sul sacco, col viso verso il cielo, a godersi quella quiete e quella luminaria dell’alto; perciò odiava le notti di luna, in cui il mare formicola di scintille, e la campagna si disegna qua e là vagamente – allora la sciara sembra più brulla e desolata. – Per noi che

  ugly. He would stand and observe with the eager curiosity of a young urchin the dogs that came running from every farmhouse in the vicinity to fight over Gray’s remains. The dogs would run away yelping when the boys appeared, and would circle around the ridges opposite, howling, but Red wouldn’t allow Frog to chase them away with stones. “You see that black bitch,” he’d say, “who isn’t afraid of your stones? She’s not afraid because she’s hungrier than the rest. Look at those ribs on her!” Now the gray donkey wasn’t suffering anymore; it lay there calmly with its four legs outstretched, and let the dogs have a good time emptying its deep eye sockets and tearing the flesh from its white bones; the teeth that ripped into its bowels wouldn’t make it bend its back the way the simplest blow with a shovel used to—those blows they used to give it to put a little energy into its body when it was climbing up the steep little path. That’s how things are! Gray, also, had had spade strokes and harness sores, and, when he was bent beneath a load and didn’t have enough breath to take another step, he, too, while being beaten, would give one of those looks that seem to say: “No more! No more!” But now those eyes are being eaten by the dogs, and Gray is laughing at the blows and the harness sores with that fleshless mouth that is all teeth. And if he had never been born, he would have been better off.

  The lava field, melancholy and deserted, extended as far as the eye could see; it rose and fell in peaks and gorges, black and wrinkled, without a cricket to chirp in it or a bird to fly over it. There was nothing to be heard, not even the pickaxe strokes of the men working underground. And, each time, Nasty Redhead repeated that it was all dug out into passages down below, in every direction, toward the mountain and toward the valley—to such an extent that a miner had once gone in with black hair and had come out with white hair; and another man, whose torch had gone out, had shouted for help in vain, but no one could hear him. “He alone hears his own shouts!” he’d say, and at that idea, even though his heart was tougher than the lava field, he’d give a start.

  “The boss frequently sends me to a great distance, where the others are afraid to go. But I’m Nasty Redhead, and if I don’t come back, no one will go looking for me.”

  And yet, during the beautiful summer nights, the stars shone brightly even over the lava field, and the surrounding countryside was dark, too, like the lava, but Nasty Redhead, weary from his long day’s work, would stretch out on his sack, his face to the sky, and enjoy that calm and that lofty light display; for that reason he hated moonlit n
ights, in which the sea teems with sparkles and the countryside can be made out vaguely here and there; at such times the lava field seems more barren and

  siamo fatti per vivere sotterra, pensava Malpelo, ci dovrebbe essere buio sempre e dappertutto. – La civetta strideva sulla sciara, e ramingava di qua e di là; ei pensava: – Anche la civetta sente i morti che son qua sotterra e si dispera perché non può andare a trovarli.

  Ranocchio aveva paura delle civette e dei pipistrelli; ma il Rosso lo sgridava perché chi è costretto a star solo non deve aver paura di nulla, e nemmeno l’asino grigio aveva paura dei cani che se lo spolpavano, ora che le sue carni non sentivano più il dolore di esser mangiate.

  – Tu eri avvezzo a lavorar sui tetti come i gatti – gli diceva – e allora era tutt’altra cosa. Ma adesso che ti tocca a viver sotterra, come i topi, non bisogna più aver paura dei topi, né dei pipistrelli, che son topi vecchi con le ali, e i topi ci stanno volentieri in compagnia dei morti.

  Ranocchio invece provava una tale compiacenza a spiegargli quel che ci stessero a far le stelle lassù in alto; e gli raccontava che lassù c’era il paradiso, dove vanno a stare i morti che sono stati buoni e non hanno dato dispiaceri ai loro genitori. – Chi te l’ha detto? – domandava Malpelo, e Ranocchio rispondeva che glielo aveva detto la mamma.

  Allora Malpelo si grattava il capo, e sorridendo gli faceva un certo verso da monellaccio malizioso che la sa lunga. – Tua madre ti dice così perché, invece dei calzoni, tu dovresti portar la gonnella. –

  E dopo averci pensato su un po’:

  – Mio padre era buono e non faceva male a nessuno, tanto che gli dicevano Bestia. Invece è là sotto, ed hanno persino trovato i ferri e le scarpe e questi calzoni qui che ho indosso io. –

  Da lì a poco, Ranocchio il quale deperiva da qualche tempo, si ammalò in modo che la sera dovevano portarlo fuori dalla cava sull’asino, disteso fra le corbe, tremante di febbre come un pulcin bagnato. Un operaio disse che quel ragazzo non ne avrebbe fatto osso duro a quel mestiere, e che per lavorare in una miniera senza lasciarvi la pelle bisognava nascervi. Malpelo allora si sentiva orgoglioso di esserci nato e di mantenersi così sano e vigoroso in quell’aria malsana, e con tutti quegli stenti. Ei si caricava Ranocchio sulle spalle, e gli faceva animo alla sua maniera, sgridandolo e picchiandolo. Ma una volta nel picchiarlo sul dorso Ranocchio fu colto da uno sbocco di sangue, allora Malpelo spaventato si affannò a cercargli nel naso e dentro la bocca cosa gli avesse fatto, e giurava che non avea potuto fargli quel gran male, così come l’aveva battuto, e a dimostrarglielo, si dava dei gran pugni sul petto e sulla schiena con un sasso; anzi un operaio, lì presente, gli sferrò un gran calcio sulle spalle, un calcio che risuonò come

  desolate. “For us who are born to live below ground,” Nasty Redhead would reflect, “there ought to be darkness always and everywhere.” The little-owl hooted on the lava, roaming here and there, and he reflected: “Even the owl senses the dead men who are below ground here, and it’s in despair because it can’t go and find them.”

  Frog was afraid of owls and bats, but Red used to bawl him out, because people who are compelled to be alone shouldn’t be afraid of anything; not even the gray donkey was afraid of the dogs that were eating it up, now that its flesh no longer felt the pain of being devoured.

  “You were accustomed to working on roofs like a cat,” he’d say to him, “and then it was a completely different matter. But now that it’s your fate to live underground like a rat, you no longer need to be afraid of rats, or of bats, which are just old rats with wings, and rats like to keep company with the dead.”

  For his part, Frog derived great pleasure from explaining to him what the stars were doing up in the sky; he’d tell him that Heaven was up there, where dead people went who were good and never grieved their parents. “Who told you so?” Nasty Redhead would ask, and Frog would reply that his mother had told him that.

  Then Nasty Redhead would scratch his head and, with a smile, would repeat a saying typical of a spiteful, know-it-all brat: “Your mother tells you that because, instead of pants, you should be wearing skirts.”

  And, after thinking it over a little:

  “My father was good and never did harm to anyone, so much so that they called him Dumb Animal. But he’s down there, and they even found his tools and shoes, and these trousers that I’m wearing right now.”

  Not long afterward, Frog, who had been in a decline for some time, became so ill that every evening he had to be carried out of the pit on the donkey’s back, sprawling among the big baskets of sand and shaking with fever like a wet chick. One workman said that that boy “would never stick it out” at that job; to work in a mine and not lose your life there, you’ve got to be born to it. At such times Nasty Redhead felt proud of being born to it and of remaining so healthy and vigorous in that bad air and with all those privations. He’d carry Frog on his back, encouraging him in his own way, by yelling at him and hitting him. But one time, when he hit him on the back, Frog spat blood; Nasty Redhead was frightened and desperately examined his nose and mouth to see what he had done to him; he swore that he couldn’t have caused such a serious injury, the way he had struck him; to prove it to him, he gave himself heavy blows on the chest and the back with a stone. In fact, a workman who was present gave Red a big kick in the back, a kick

  su di un tamburo, eppure Malpelo non si mosse, e soltanto dopo che l’operaio se ne fu andato, aggiunse: – Lo vedi? Non mi ha fatto nulla! E ha picchiato più forte di me, ti giuro!

  Intanto Ranocchio non guariva e seguitava a sputar sangue, e ad aver la febbre tutti i giorni. Allora Malpelo rubò dei soldi della paga della settimana, per comperargli del vino e della minestra calda, e gli diede i suoi calzoni quasi nuovi che lo coprivano meglio. Ma Ranocchio tossiva sempre e alcune volte sembrava soffocasse, e la sera non c’era modo di vincere il ribrezzo della febbre, né con sacchi, né coprendolo di paglia, né mettendolo dinanzi alla fiammata. Malpelo se ne stava zitto ed immobile chino su di lui, colle mani sui ginocchi, fissandolo con quei suoi occhiacci spalancati come se volesse fargli il ritratto, e allorché lo udiva gemere sottovoce, e gli vedeva il viso trafelato e l’occhio spento, preciso come quello dell’asino grigio allorché ansava rifinito sotto il carico nel salire la viottola, ei gli borbottava: – È meglio che tu crepi presto! Se devi soffrire in tal modo, è meglio che tu crepi! – E il padrone diceva che Malpelo era capace di schiacciargli il capo a quel ragazzo, e bisognava sorvegliarlo.

  Finalmente un lunedì Ranocchio non venne più alla cava, e il padrone se ne lavò le mani, perché allo stato in cui era ridotto oramai era più di impiccio che d’altro. Malpelo si informò dove stesse di casa, e il sabato andò a trovarlo. Il povero Ranocchio era più di là che di qua, e sua madre piangeva e si disperava come se il suo figliolo fosse di quelli che guadagnano dieci lire la settimana.

  Cotesto non arrivava a comprendere Malpelo, e domandò a Ranocchio perché sua madre strillasse a quel modo, mentre che da due mesi ei non guadagnava nemmeno quel che si mangiava. Ma il povero Ranocchio non gli dava retta e sembrava che badasse a contare quanti travicelli c’erano sul tetto. Allora il Rosso si diede ad almanaccare che la madre di Ranocchio strillasse a quel modo perché il suo figliuolo era sempre stato debole e malaticcio, e l’aveva tenuto come quei marmocchi che non si slattano mai. Egli invece era stato sano e robusto, ed era malpelo, e sua madre non aveva mai pianto per lui perché non aveva mai avuto timore di perderlo.

  Poco dopo, alla cava dissero che Ranocchio era morto, ed ei pensò che la civetta adesso strideva anche per lui nella notte, e tornò a visitare le ossa spolpate del grigio, nel burrone dove solevano andare insieme con Ranocchio. Ora del grigio non rimanevano più che le ossa sgangherate, ed anche di Ranocchio sarebbe stato così, e sua madre si sarebbe asciugati gli occhi, poiché anche la madre di Malpelo s’era

  that made a noise like a drum, but Nasty Redhead didn’t budge. It was only after the workman went away that he added: “See? He didn’t do a thing to me! And he hit harder than I d
id, I swear to you!”

  Meanwhile Frog didn’t get better; he continued to spit blood, and to be feverish every day. Then Nasty Redhead stole a little money from his week’s pay to buy him wine and hot soup, and gave him his almost-new trousers, which covered him better. But Frog was always coughing; sometimes he seemed to be choking; and in the evenings there was no way to prevent him from shuddering with fever, neither by piling sacks on him, nor by covering him with straw, nor by putting him in front of a blazing fire. Nasty Redhead would stay bent over him, in silence and motionless, hands on knees, staring at him with those malicious eyes of his wide open, as if he wanted to do a portrait of him; whenever he heard him moan quietly, or saw his breathless face and glassy eyes—just like those of the gray donkey when it panted in exhaustion beneath its load while climbing the incline—he’d murmur to him: “You’re better off croaking quickly! If you have to suffer this way, you’re better off croaking!” And the pit owner used to say that Nasty Redhead was capable of crushing that boy’s skull, and that it was necessary to keep an eye on him.

  Finally one Monday Frog didn’t show up at the pit, and the owner washed his hands of him, because in the condition to which he was now reduced he was more of a hindrance than anything else. Nasty Redhead inquired as to where he lived, and on Saturday he went to visit him. Poor Frog was more dead than alive, and his mother was weeping and lamenting as if her son were one of those who earn ten lire a week.

  Nasty Redhead couldn’t manage to comprehend this, and he asked Frog why his mother was shrieking like that, seeing that for two months he hadn’t even been earning the cost of his food. But poor Frog paid no attention to him; he seemed to be intent on counting the number of rafters in the roof. Then Red, puzzling it out, decided that Frog’s mother was shrieking that way because her son had always been weak and sickly, and she had maintained him like those babies that can never be weaned. He, on the other hand, had been healthy and sturdy, and he was a nasty redhead, so that his mother had never cried over him because she had never been afraid of losing him.