Sicilian Stories

by Giovanni Verga

  “Oh, Holy Mother of God!” Carmenio sobbed. “What can that bell be for? Oh, people from the ‘prickly-pear flock,’ help! Oh, good Christian people, help! Oh, good Christian people, help!” he started to shout.

  Finally, up there, on top of the prickly-pear mountain, was heard a faraway voice, like the Francofonte church bell.

  “Oh . . . what’s wrong? . . . what’s wrong? . . .”

  “Help me, good Christian people! Help! Here at farmer Decu’s place! . . .”

  “Oh . . . chase after the sheep . . . chase after them! . . .”

  “No! No! It’s not about the sheep . . . it’s not! . . .”

  At that moment an owl flew over and started to hoot on the cottage.

  “That does it!” murmured Carmenio, crossing himself. “Now the owl has smelled death! Now my mother is dying!”

  Alone in the cottage with his mother, who was no longer speaking, he felt like crying. “Mother, what’s wrong? Mother, answer me! Are you cold, Mother?” She wasn’t breathing; her face was dark. He lit the fire between the two stones on the hearth, and started watching the branches burning; they blazed up and then puffed as if they were uttering words.

  When they had been with the flocks at Resecone, at their evening gatherings a man from Francofonte had told them stories about witches riding brooms and casting spells in the flames of the hearth. Carmenio still recalled how the people in the farmhouse had

  ascoltare con tanto d’occhi, dinanzi al lumicino appeso al pilastro del gran palmento buio, che a nessuno gli bastava l’animo di andarsene a dormire nel suo cantuccio, quella sera.

  Giusto ci aveva l’abitino della Madonna sotto la camicia, e la fettuccia di santa Agrippina legata al polso, che s’era fatta nera dal tempo. Nella stessa tasca ci aveva il suo zufolo di canna, che gli rammentava le sere d’estate – Juh! juh! – quando si lasciano entrare le pecore nelle stoppie gialle como l’oro, dappertutto, e i grilli scoppiettano nell’ora di mezzogiorno, e le lodole calano trillando a rannicchiarsi dietro le zolle col tramonto, e si sveglia l’odore della nepitella e del ramerino. – Juh! juh! Bambino Gesù! – A Natale, quando era andato al paese, suonavano così per la novena, davanti all’altarino illuminato e colle frasche d’arancio, e in ogni casa, davanti all’uscio, i ragazzi giocavano alla fossetta, col bel sole di dicembre sulla schiena. Poi s’erano avviati per la messa di mezzanotte, in folla coi vicini, urtandosi e ridendo per le strade buie. Ah! perché adesso ci aveva quella spina in cuore? e la mamma che non diceva più nulla! Ancora per mezzanotte ci voleva un gran pezzo. Fra i sassi delle pareti senza intonaco pareva che ci fossero tanti occhi ad ogni buco, che guardavano dentro, nel focolare, gelati e neri.

  Sul suo stramazzo, in un angolo, era buttato un giubbone, lungo disteso, che pareva le maniche si gonfiassero; e il diavolo del San Michele Arcangelo, nella immagine appiccicata a capo del lettuccio, digrignava i denti bianchi, colle mani nei capelli, fra i zig-zag rossi dell’inferno.

  L’indomani, pallidi come tanti morti, arrivarono Santo, la Rossa coi bambini dietro, e Lucia che in quell’angustia non pensava a nascondere il suo stato. Attorno al lettuccio della morta si strappavano i capelli, e si davano dei pugni in testa, senza pensare ad altro. Poi come Santo si accorse della sorella con tanto di pancia, ch’era una vergogna, si mise a dire in mezzo al piagnisteo:

  – Almeno avesse lasciato chiudere gli occhi a quella vecchierella, almeno! . . .

  E Lucia dal canto suo:

  – L’avessi saputo, l’avessi! Non le facevo mancare il medico e lo speziale, ora che ho 20 onze.

  – Ella è in Paradiso e prega Dio per noi peccatori; conchiuse la Rossa. Sa che la dote ce l’avete, ed è tranquilla, poveretta. Mastro Brasi ora vi sposerà di certo.

  clustered around to listen, their eyes wide open, in front of the little lamp hanging from the pillar of the big, dark winery; no one was brave enough to go and sleep in his own corner, that evening.

  Yes, he had his abitino della Madonna under his shirt, and his St. Agrippina’s ribbon, darkened with age, tied to his wrist. In his pocket he had his reed pipe, which reminded him of those summer evenings—tootle, tootle—when you allow the sheep to enter the golden-yellow stubble fields all around, and the crickets chirp at midday, and the larks descend with a trill to nest behind the sods at sunset, and the aroma of the calamint and rosemary is awakened. “Yooh, yooh, Baby Jesus!” At Christmas, when he had gone to the village, they were playing that for the novena, in front of the little altar that was illuminated and decorated with orange branches; and in every house, in front of the door, the children were playing fossetta,8 with the lovely December sun on their backs. Then his family had set out for midnight Mass, joining the crowd of neighbors, jostling one another and laughing in the dark streets. Ah, why did he now have that thorn in his heart? And his mother was no longer speaking! It was still a long way till midnight. Amid the stones of the unplastered wall, there seemed to be countless eyes at each hole, staring coldly and blackly inside, into the hearth.

  On his pallet in one corner was thrown a jacket, fully spread out, so that its sleeves seemed to be swelling. And the devil subdued by the archangel St. Michael, in the holy picture on the wall over the head of the cot, was gnashing his white teeth, his hands in his hair, amid the red zigzags of Hell.

  The next day, all of them as pale as death, came Santo, Redhead with her children tagging behind, and Lucia, who, in her distress, had no thought of concealing her condition. Standing around the dead woman’s cot, they tore their hair and punched themselves in the head, their minds on nothing else. Then, when Santo had noticed his sister with such a big belly that it was a disgrace, he started to say, amid all that wailing:

  “If at least you had waited until this poor old woman passed on, at least! . . .”

  For her part, Lucia said:

  “If I had only known, only known! I wouldn’t have let her do without the doctor and the pharmacist, now that I have 20 onze.”

  “She’s in Heaven and she’s praying to God for us sinners,” Redhead said in conclusion. “She knows you have your dowry, and she’s in peace, poor woman. Master Brasi will surely marry you now.”

  __________

  8. “Little hole,” a game consisting of tossing a small ball and getting it to fall into a slight round depression in the ground.

  LIBERTÀ

  Sciorinarono dal campanile un fazzoletto a tre colori, suonarono le campane a stormo, e cominciarono a gridare in piazza: «Viva la libertà!»

  Come il mare in tempesta. La folla spumeggiava e ondeggiava davanti al casino dei galantuomini, davanti al Municipio, sugli scalini della chiesa: un mare di berrette bianche; le scuri e le falci che luccicavano. Poi irruppe in una stradicciuola.

  – A te prima, barone! che hai fatto nerbare la gente dai tuoi campieri! – Innanzi a tutti gli altri una strega, coi vecchi capelli irti sul capo, armata soltanto delle unghie. – A te, prete del diavolo! che ci hai succhiato l’anima! – A te, ricco epulone, che non puoi scappare nemmeno, tanto sei grasso del sangue del povero! – A te, sbirro! che hai fatto la giustizia solo per chi non aveva niente! – A te, guardaboschi! che hai venduto la tua carne e la carne del prossimo per due tarì al giorno!

  E il sangue che fumava ed ubbriacava. Le falci, le mani, i cenci, i sassi, tutto rosso di sangue! – Ai galantuomini! Ai cappelli! Ammazza! ammazza! Addosso ai cappelli!

  Don Antonio sgattaiolava a casa per le scorciatoie. Il primo colpo lo fece cascare colla faccia insanguinata contro il marciapiede. – Perché? perché mi ammazzate? – Anche tu! al diavolo! – Un monello sciancato raccattò il cappello bisunto e ci sputò dentro. – Abbasso i cappelli! Viva la libertà! – Te’! tu pure! – Al reverendo che predicava l’inferno per chi rubava il pane. Egli tornava dal dir messa, coll’ostia consacrata nel pancione. – Non mi ammazzate, ché sono in peccato mortale – La gnà Lucia, il peccato mortale; la gnà Lucia che il padre gli aveva venduta a 14 anni,

  LIBERTY

  From the belltower they hung out a tricolored clot
h;1 they sounded an alarm with the bells, and began to shout in the square: “Long live liberty!”

  It was like a stormy sea. The crowd heaved and frothed like waves in front of the gentry’s club, in front of the village hall, and on the church steps: a sea of white peasant caps; the axes and scythes were gleaming. Then the crowd invaded a narrow street.

  “You get it first, Baron! You’ve had poor folk whipped by your field watchmen!” In front of all the rest went an old hag, with her hair standing up on her head, armed only with her fingernails. “Now it’s your turn, devil’s priest! You drained the very soul out of us!” “Now for you, you rich glutton! You can’t even run away, you’ve become so fat on poor people’s blood!” “Now for you, policeman! You carried out the law only against those who had nothing!” “Now for you, gamekeeper! You sold your own flesh and the flesh of your fellow man for two tarì a day!”

  And the blood gave off fumes and intoxicated them. Their scythes, their hands, their tattered clothing, the stones, everything was red with blood! “Let’s get the gentlefolk! Let’s get the felt hats! Kill! Kill! After the felt hats!”

  Don Antonio was sneaking away home by shortcuts. The first blow made him fall with his bloodied face against the sidewalk. “Why? Why are you killing me?” “You, too! Go to the devil!” A crippled urchin picked up the soiled hat and spat into it. “Down with the felt hats! Long live liberty!” “Take that! You, too!” they called to the reverend, who used to preach that stealers of bread would go to Hell. He was on his way back from saying Mass, the consecrated wafer in his big belly. “Don’t kill me, because I’m in a state of mortal sin!” That mortal sin was Mis’ Lucia: Mis’ Lucia, whose father had sold her when she was fourteen, during the

  __________

  1. Red, white, and green. These were the colors of the Kingdom of Piedmont, under whose auspices Garibaldi was freeing Sicily from the Kingdom of Naples (Two Sicilies). After the unification of Italy, they became the national colors.

  l’inverno della fame, e riempiva la Ruota e le strade di monelli affamati. Se quella carne di cane fosse valsa a qualche cosa, ora avrebbero potuto satollarsi, mentre la sbrandellavano sugli usci delle case e sui ciottoli della strada a colpi di scure. Anche il lupo allorché capita affamato in una mandra, non pensa a riempirsi il ventre, e sgozza dalla rabbia. – Il figliuolo della Signora, che era accorso per vedere cosa fosse – lo speziale, nel mentre chiudeva in fretta e in furia – don Paolo, il quale tornava dalla vigna a cavallo del somarello, colle bisacce magre in groppa. Pure teneva in capo un berrettino vecchio che la sua ragazza gli aveva ricamato tempo fa, quando il male non aveva ancora colpito la vigna. Sua moglie lo vide cadere dinanzi al portone, mentre aspettava coi cinque figliuoli la scarsa minestra che era nelle bisacce del marito. – Paolo! Paolo! – Il primo lo colse nella spalla con un colpo di scure. Un altro gli fu addosso colla falce, e lo sventrò mentre si attaccava col braccio sanguinante al martello.

  Ma il peggio avvenne appena cadde il figliolo del notaio, un ragazzo di undici anni, biondo come l’oro, non si sa come, travolto nella folla. Suo padre si era rialzato due o tre volte prima di strascinarsi a finire nel mondezzaio, gridandogli: – Neddu! Neddu! – Neddu fuggiva, dal terrore, cogli occhi e la bocca spalancati senza poter gridare. Lo rovesciarono; si rizzò anch’esso su di un ginocchio come suo padre; il torrente gli passò sopra; uno gli aveva messo lo scarpone sulla guancia e glie l’aveva sfracellata; nonostante il ragazzo chiedeva ancora grazia colle mani. – Non voleva morire, no, come aveva visto ammazzare suo padre; – strappava il cuore! – Il taglialegna, dalla pietà, gli menò un gran colpo di scure colle due mani, quasi avesse dovuto abbattere un rovere di cinquant’anni – e tremava come una foglia – Un altro gridò: – Bah! egli sarebbe stato notaio, anche lui!

  Non importa! Ora che si avevano le mani rosse di quel sangue, bisognava versare tutto il resto. Tutti! tutti i cappelli! – Non era più la fame, le bastonate, le soperchierie che facevano ribollire la collera. Era il sangue innocente. Le donne più feroci ancora, agitando le braccia scarne, strillando d’ira in falsetto, colle carni tenere sotto i brindelli delle vesti. – Tu che venivi a pregare il buon Dio colla veste di seta! – Tu che avevi a schifo d’inginocchiarti accanto alla povera gente! – Te’! Te’! – Nelle case, su per le scale, dentro le alcove, lacerando la seta e la tela fine. Quanti orecchini su delle facce insanguinate! e quanti anelli d’oro nelle mani che cercavano di parare i colpi di scure!

  famine winter, and who filled the streets and the convent’s receptacle for foundlings with hungry urchins. If that rabble had amounted to anything, now would have been the time to glut themselves, with the well-to-do being cut to bits with axe blows on the doorsteps of houses and the cobblestones of the streets. Hungry wolves, too, when they attack a flock, don’t think about filling their bellies, but slaughter out of rage. They killed the great lady’s son, who had come running to see what was going on; the pharmacist, while he was shutting up shop in hot haste; Don Paolo, who was riding his little donkey on his way home from his vineyard, with the thin saddlebags on its cruppers—even though he was wearing an old peasant-style cap that his daughter had embroidered for him long ago, before the plant disease had attacked the vines. His wife saw him succumb in front of the big doorway, while she was waiting with her five children for the scanty provisions contained in her husband’s saddlebags. “Paolo! Paolo!” The first attacker hit him in the shoulder with an axe. Another man assailed him with his scythe, and disemboweled him while he clung to the knocker with his bleeding arm.

  But the worst occurred as soon as the notary’s son went down, a boy of eleven with hair as yellow as gold; no one knew how it happened, he was just knocked over in the crowd. His father had arisen two or three times before dragging himself to a garbage dump, while shouting to him: “Neddu! Neddu!” Neddu was running away in terror, his eyes and mouth wide open, though he was unable to cry out. He was overturned; he, too, rose up on one knee, like his father; the torrent passed over him; one man had put his heavy shoe on his cheek, fracturing it; despite that, the boy was still begging for mercy with a gesture of his hands. He didn’t want to die, no, the way he had seen his father killed. It tore your heart out! The woodcutter, out of pity, dealt him a mighty two-handed axe blow, as if he needed to fell a fifty-year-old oak, and he was shaking like a leaf. Another man shouted: “Bah! He would have grown up to be another notary!”

  It didn’t matter! Now that their hands were red with that blood, they had to spill all the rest. All of them! All the felt hats! It was no longer their hunger, the beatings and outrages they had been subjected to, that made their anger boil over. It was the sight of that innocent blood. The women were even more savage, waving their scrawny arms, shrieking in piercing tones in their rage, their soft skin showing beneath their ragged dresses. “You who came to pray to God in your silk dress!” “You who felt disgusted to kneel down alongside poor people!” “Take that! Take that!” In the houses, on the stairs, in the bed recesses, ripping apart the silk and the fine fabrics. All those earrings on bloodstained faces! All those gold rings on hands trying to fend off axe blows!

  La baronessa aveva fatto barricare il portone: travi, carri di campagna, botti piene, dietro; e i campieri che sparavano dalle finestre per vender cara la pelle. La folla chinava il capo alle schioppettate, perché non aveva armi da rispondere. Prima c’era la pena di morte chi tenesse armi da fuoco. – Viva la libertà! – E sfondarono il portone. Poi nella corte, sulle gradinate, scavalcando i feriti. Lasciarono stare i campieri. – I campieri dopo! – Prima volevano le carni della baronessa, le carni fatte di pernici e di vin buono. Ella correva di stanza in stanza col lattante al seno, scarmigliata – e le stanze erano molte. Si udiva la folla urlare per quegli andirivieni, avvicinandosi come la piena di un fiume. Il figlio maggiore, di 16 anni, ancora colle carni bianche anch’esso, puntellava l’uscio colle sue mani tremanti, gridando: – Mamà! mamà! – Al primo urto gli rovesciarono l’uscio addosso. Egli si afferrava alle gambe che lo calpestavano.
Non gridava più. Sua madre s’era rifugiata nel balcone, tenendo avvinghiato il bambino, chiudendogli la bocca colla mano perché non gridasse, pazza. L’altro figliolo voleva difenderla col suo corpo, stralunato, quasi avesse avute cento mani, afferrando pel taglio tutte quelle scuri. Li separarono in un lampo. Uno abbrancò lei pei capelli, un altro per i fianchi, un altro per le vesti, sollevandola al di sopra della ringhiera. Il carbonaio le strappò dalle braccia il bambino lattante. L’altro fratello non vide niente; non vedeva altro che nero e rosso. Lo calpestavano, gli macinavano le ossa a colpi di tacchi ferrati; egli aveva addentato una mano che lo stringeva alla gola e non la lasciava più. Le scuri non potevano colpire nel mucchio e luccicavano in aria.

  E in quel carnevale furibondo del mese di luglio, in mezzo agli urli briachi della folla digiuna, continuava a suonare a stormo la campana di Dio, fino a sera, senza mezzogiorno, senza avemaria, come in paese di turchi. Cominciavano a sbandarsi, stanchi della carneficina, mogi, mogi, ciascuno fuggendo il compagno. Prima di notte tutti gli usci erano chiusi, paurosi, e in ogni casa vegliava il lume. Per le stradicciuole non si udivano altro che i cani, frugando per i canti, con un rosicchiare secco di ossa, nel chiaro di luna che lavava ogni cosa, e mostrava spalancati i portoni e le finestre delle case deserte.

  Aggiornava; una domenica senza gente in piazza né messa che suonasse. Il sagrestano s’era rintanato; di preti non se ne trovavano più. I primi che cominciarono a far capannello sul sagrato si guardavano in faccia sospettosi; ciascuno ripensando a quel che doveva avere sulla coscienza il vicino. Poi, quando furono in molti, si diedero a

  The baroness had had her big street door barricaded, placing beams, country carts, and filled casks behind it; and her field watchmen were firing from the windows to sell their lives dearly. The crowd lowered their heads when shots rang out, because they had no weapons to respond with. Earlier there had been a death penalty for bearing firearms. “Long live liberty!” And they broke down the door. Then they swarmed into the courtyard and up the staircases, stepping over the wounded. They let the watchmen alone. “The watchmen later!” First they wanted the baroness’s flesh, that flesh composed of partridges and good wine. She ran from room to room with her infant at her breast, all tousled—and there were many rooms. The crowd could be heard howling in anger at that scurrying to and fro; they were coming nearer like a river in full spate. Her older son, a boy of sixteen, he, too, still fair-complexioned, was buttressing the door to the room with both trembling hands and shouting: “Mommy! Mommy!” At the first impetus the door fell in on top of him. He tried to clutch the legs that were trampling him. He was no longer shouting. His mother had taken refuge on the balcony, holding her baby boy tightly and closing his mouth with her hand so he wouldn’t call out; she was mad with fear. Her other son, beside himself, tried to defend her with his body, as if he had a hundred hands, seizing all those axes by their cutting edges. Mother and son were separated in a flash. One man grabbed her by her hair, another by her sides, and another by her clothes, lifting her over the railing. The charcoal burner tore the nursing baby from her arms. The second brother saw none of this; all he saw was black and red. He was trampled; his bones were ground by hobnailed heels. He had sunk his teeth into a hand that was squeezing his throat and that refused to let go. There was such a throng that the axes were unable to fall, but merely gleamed in the air.