Under the Shadow of Etna Part 4

"What do you want?" demanded Mara.

He knew not what he wanted.

"Oh! what will you do here all alone?" asked the girl.

"I shall stay with the colts."

Mara ran skipping away, and he stood there as if rooted to the spot so as to catch the last sounds of the cart rattling over the stones.

The sun was just resting on the high rocks of the _Poggio alla Croce_, the gray crests of the olive trees were shading into the twilight and over the vast campagna far away, nothing was heard except the tinkling bell of "Bianca" in the gathering stillness.

Mara, now that she was in the midst of new faces and amid all the bustle of the grape gathering, forgot about Jeli; but he was always thinking about her, because he had nothing else to do in the long days that he spent looking at the horses' tails. There was now no special reason for him to go down into the valley beyond the bridge, and no one ever saw him any more at the farm.

Thus it was that he was for some time ignorant that Mara had become betrothed--so much water had run and run under the bridge. The only time that he saw the girl was on the day of Saint John's _Festa_, when he went to the fair with his colts to sell; a festa which changed everything for him into poison, and caused the bread to fall out of his mouth by reason of an accident that befell one of the _padrone's_ colts--the Lord deliver us!

On the day of the fair, the factor waited for the colts ever since dawn, walking impatiently up and down in his well-polished boots behind the groups of horses and mules that came filing in along the highway from this direction and that. It was almost time for the fair to close, and still Jeli with his animals was not in sight beyond the turn made by the highway. On the parched slopes of _Calvario_ and the _Mulino a vento_--the Wind-Mill Mountain--there remained only a few droves of sheep gathered in a circle, with noses drooping and weary eyes, and a few yoke of oxen with long hair--of the kind that are sold to satisfy unpaid rent, waiting motionless under the boiling sun.

Yonder toward the valley, the bell of San Giovanni's was ringing for High Ma.s.s, accompanied by the long crackling of the fireworks.

Then the fair grounds seemed to spring up, and there ran a prolonged cry among the shops of the green grocers, cl.u.s.tered in the place called _salita dei Galli_, spreading through the country roads and seeming to return from the valley where the church stood.

"Viva San Giovanni!"

"_Santo diavolone!_" screamed the factor. "That a.s.sa.s.sin of a Jeli will make me lose the fair!"

The sheep lifted their heads in astonishment and began to bleat all at once, and the cattle also made a step or two, slowly looking around with their great, calm eyes.

The factor was in a rage because he was expected that day to pay the rent due for the large enclosures--as the contract expressed it, "when Saint John arrived under the elm;" and to make up the full sum, the profits on the sale of the colts was necessary. Meantime the colts and horses and mules were coming in such numbers as the good Lord had seen fit to make, all curried and s.h.i.+ning and adorned with ta.s.sels and c.o.c.kades and bells; and they were switching their tails to while away their tedium, and turning their heads toward every one who pa.s.sed, and evidently waiting for some charitable soul willing to buy them.

"He must have gone to sleep on the way, the a.s.sa.s.sin!" yelled the factor, "and so made me lose the sale of my colts."

In reality, Jeli had travelled all night so that the colts might reach the fair fresh, and get a good position on their arrival; and he had reached the _piano del Corvo_, and the "three kings" had not yet set, but were s.h.i.+ning over _monte Arturo_. There was a continuous procession of carts pa.s.sing along the road, and people mounted on horses or mules going to the _festa_. Therefore, the young fellow kept his eyes open so that the colts, frightened by the unusual commotion, might not get away, but that he might keep them together along the ridge of the road behind _la bianca_, the white mare, who with the bell around her neck, always travelled straight ahead without minding anything.

From time to time, when the road ran over the crest of the hills, the bell of Saint John's could be heard in the distance, and in the darkness and silence of the plain the rumor of the _festa_ was distinguishable, and along the whole road far away, wherever there were people on foot or on horseback going to Vizzini, were heard shouts of "_Viva San Giovanni!_" And the rockets rose up high in the air and brilliant behind the mountains of la Canzaria, like the rain of meteors in August.

"It is like Christmas Eve!" Jeli kept saying to the boy, who was helping him drive the herd. "And in every place there is feasting and light, and throughout the whole campagna you can see fireworks."

The boy was half asleep as he forced one leg after the other, and he made no response; but Jeli, who felt his blood stir within him at the sound of that bell, could not keep quiet, as if each one of those rockets that left their silent s.h.i.+ning trails on the darkness behind the mountains burst forth from his soul.

"Mara also must be going to the _festa_ of Saint John," he said, "because she goes every year."

And without caring because the boy made no reply,--

"Don't you know? Mara is now so big that she must be taller than her mother, and when I saw her last I couldn't believe that it was the very same girl with whom I used to go after p.r.i.c.kly pears and knock off the nuts."

And he began to sing at the top of his voice all the songs that he knew.

"Oh Alfio, why do you sleep?" he cried, when he was through with them. "Look out that you keep _la bianca_ always behind you, look out!"

"No, I am not asleep," replied Alfio, with a hoa.r.s.e voice.

"Do you see _la puddara_[8] which stands winking down at us yonder, as if they were firing up rockets also at Santa Domenica? It is almost sunrise; we shall reach the fair in time to secure a good position.

Ah! _morellino bello_! you pretty little brownie! You shall have a new halter, that you shall, with red c.o.c.kades for the fair; and so shall you, _stellato_!"[9]

[8] La puddara is the Sicilian name for Ursa Major,--the Big Bear.

[9] Stellato, starred, said of a horse with a white spot in his forehead.

Thus he went on, talking to one and another of his colts so that they might be encouraged hearing his voice in the darkness. But it grieved him to think that the _stellato_ and the _morellino_ were going to the fair to be sold.

"When they are sold, they'll go off with a new master, and we shan't see them any more in the herd, just as it was with Mara after she went to Marineo.

"Her father is well-to-do down there at Marineo, and when I was there, found myself, poor fellow that I was, sitting down to bread and wine and cheese, and everything good that G.o.d gives, and as if he were the factor himself, and he has the keys to everything, and I could eat up the whole place if I had wanted. Mara scarcely knew me, it had been so long since we had seen each other, and she cried out,--'Oh, look!

there's Jeli the guardian of the horses, from Tebidi. He is like one who comes home from abroad, who only at the sight of the distant mountain-top is quick enough to recognize the country where he grew up.' _Gna_ Lia didn't want me to speak to her daughter with the _thee_ and the _thou_, because Mara had grown to be so big, and the people who don't know about things easily gossip. But Mara only laughed, and looked as if she had only just that minute been baking the bread, so rosy her face was; she was getting the dinner ready, and she was unfolding the table-cloth, and she seemed different. 'Oh, have you forgotten Tebidi?' I asked her as soon as _gna_ Lia went out to broach a fresh cask of wine. 'No, no, I haven't forgotten' said she. 'At Tebidi there was a bell with a campanile looking like the handle of a salt-cellar, and there used to be two stone cats which stood at the entrance of the garden.' I felt all through me those things that she was saying. Mara looked at me from head to heels, with her eyes wide open, and then she said,--'How tall you've grown!' and then she began to laugh, and then she patted me on the head--here!"

In this way Jeli, the guardian of the horses, came to lose his place; for just at that instant there suddenly appeared a coach, which had given no sign of its approach, because it had been slowly climbing the steep ascent, but started off at full speed as soon as it reached the level ground at the top, with a great cracking of whips and jingling of bells, as if it were carried by the devil himself. The colts, in alarm, galloped off quicker than a flash, as if there had been an earthquake, and all the shouts and cries and _ohi! ohi!

ohi's!_ of Jeli and the boy scarcely sufficed to collect them again around _la bianca_, who in spite of her gravity had s.h.i.+ed away desperately with the bell around her neck.

When Jeli had counted over his animals he discovered that _stellato_ was missing, and he buried his hands in his hair, because at that place the road ran along side a deep ravine, and it was down in that ravine that _stellato_ broke his back--a colt worth a dozen _onze_, like a dozen angels from Paradise! Weeping and shouting he went calling the colt _ahu! ahu!_ It was too dark to see it. At last _stellato_ replied from the bottom of the ravine with a melancholy neigh, as if it had human speech, poor creature!

"Oh, mamma mia!" cried Jeli and the boy, as they went to it. "Oh, what bad luck! mamma mia!"

The travellers on their way to the _festa_, hearing such a lamentation in the darkness, asked what they had lost, and then when they learned what had happened, went on their way.

The _stellato_ remained motionless where it had fallen, with its legs in the air, and while Jeli was feeling it all over, weeping and talking to it as if he could make it understand, the poor creature stretched out its neck painfully and turned its head toward him, and then could be heard its breathing, cut short by its agony.

"Something must be broken!" mourned Jeli in despair, because nothing could be seen in the darkness; and the colt, inert as a rock, let its head fall back. Alfio, who remained on the road above in charge of the drove, had begun to view the matter more calmly, and had taken out his bread from his bag.

The sky by this time was beginning to grow pale, and the mountains all around seemed to be blossoming out, one after another, dark and high.

From the bend in the road the country round about began to stand out, with _monte del Calvario_ and _monte del Mulino a vento_--the Windmill Mountain--outlined against the dawn. They were still in shadow, but the flocks of sheep made white blurs, and as the herds of cattle grazing along the ridge of the mountains wandered hither and thither against the azure sky, it seemed as if the profile of the mountain itself were alive and full of motion.

The bell from the depths of the valley was no longer heard; travellers were growing less numerous, and those who pa.s.sed along were in haste to reach the fair. Poor Jeli knew not what saint to call on in that solitude. Alfio himself could not help him in any way; so the boy continued breaking off the morsels of his loaf leisurely.

At last the factor was seen coming along mounted, cursing and swearing as he came, at seeing his animals stopped on the road. When Alfio saw him he ran off down the hill. But Jeli did not stir from the side of the _stellato_. The factor left his mule by the roadside, and climbed down into the ravine. He tried to help the colt to rise; he pulled him by the tail.

"Let him be," said Jeli, as white in the face as if it were himself whose back was broken. "Let him be! Don't you see that he can't move, poor creature."

The _stellato_, in fact, at every movement and at every attempt made to help him, set up a screech that seemed human. The factor fell on Jeli tooth and nail, and gave him as many kicks as there are angels and saints in Paradise. By this time Alfio had got his courage back, and had returned to the road, so that the animals might not be without a guardian, and he tried to excuse himself, saying, "'T wasn't my fault. I was on ahead with the _bianca_."

"There's nothing more to be done," said the factor at last, having persuaded himself that it was all time lost. "Nothing can be done with this colt but to take his pelt; that's good for something."

Jeli began to tremble like a leaf when he saw the factor go and fetch his gun from the mule's pack.

"Get off of him, good-for-nothing!" shouted the factor. "I don't know what keeps me from laying you out beside this colt, which is worth more than you, in spite of the swine's baptism which that thief of a priest gave you!"

The _stellato_, unable to move, turned its head, with its big, steady eyes, as if it understood every word, and its skin crisped in waves along the back-bone as if a chill ran over it.