After the Divorce by Grazia Deledda (buy e reader .txt) 📕

“The Lord preserve us! Why, that is frightful!”

“What do you think? I saw some dolphins at sea; the strangest-looking creatures⁠—Oh! here are our guests; good morning; what have you been about?”

Giovanna described the meeting with her husband, and was beginning to cry again, when Aunt Porredda took her by the hand and led her into the kitchen.

“You have need of all your strength today, my soul,” said she, setting before her a large cup of café-au-lait. A little later the two women started out again for the Court of Assize; Paolo promising to join them there.

“Courage!” said Aunt Porredda, as she took leave of Giovanna, and the latter heard her husband’s sentence in the kind hostess’s tone, and went off with the look of a whipped dog.

Paolo followed her with his eyes; then, limping across the courtyard to his mother, he said a singular thing:

“Listen to me, mamma; before two years have gone by that young woman will be married to someone else!”

“What do you mean by saying such a thing, Dr. Pededdu!” cried the mother, who always addressed her son by his nickname when she was angry with him. “Upon my word, you must be crazy!”

“Oh! mamma, I have crossed the sea,” he replied. “Let us hope, at all events, that she will engage me as her lawyer.”

“That young man devours his food like a dog,” said Giovanna to her mother, as they descended the steep little street. “May the Lord have mercy on him!”

Aunt Bachissia, walking along plunged in thought, answered through her clenched teeth, “He will make a good lawyer; he will gnaw his clients to the bone and then swallow them whole!”

Then the two walked on in silence, but a moment later Aunt Bachissia stumbled, and as she did so, for some reason that she could not fathom, it flashed into her mind that, should it ever so fall out that Giovanna were to apply for a divorce, she would ask Paolo to be their lawyer.

It was eight o’clock when they reached the Cathedral Square, and the small windows of the Court House close by were sending back dazzling reflections of the early morning sun.

The little granite-paved square was already crowded with country friends and neighbours, witnesses in the trial. Some of these immediately approached the two women, and greeted them with the inevitable commonplace: “Courage! Courage!”

“Oh! courage; yes, we have plenty of it, thank you,” said Aunt Bachissia. “Now leave us in peace.” And she continued on her way, as proud and erect as a racehorse. The road was only too familiar already, and she followed it straight to the fateful hall. Behind her came Giovanna, and behind her, the others: heavily bearded, roughly clad men; a handful of idlers; last of all, a nearsighted old woman with no teeth.

The jury, most of them old and fat, were already in their places. One of them had an enormous hooked nose; two others, fierce-eyed, thickly bearded men, looked like bandits; three sat in a little group with their heads close together, laughing over something in a newspaper.

In a few moments the judge appeared, his rosy face surrounded by a straggling white beard. Then came the public prosecutor, a young man with a fair, drooping moustache, flushed and tyrannical-looking. Then the registrar, the ushers⁠—all of these functionaries looking to Giovanna, in their black robes, like so many evil genii come to weave their fatal spells about poor Costantino.

And there he was himself! Erect in the cage, like some frightened animal held in leash by the two stony-faced carbineers. His gaze was fastened upon Giovanna, but now there was no smile; he seemed overpowered by the weight of his misery; and, as his glance fell upon those men, the arbiters of his fate, his clear, childlike eyes contracted and grew dark with terror.

Giovanna, too, seemed to feel the grip of an iron hand on her heart, and at times the sensation was so acute as to give her actual physical pain.

The lawyer for the defence, a little pink-and-yellow man, with a high-pitched, querulous voice, began his speech.

His defence had been sufficiently unfortunate from the first; now he merely repeated what had already been said; and his words seemed to fall into space like drops of water dripping into a great empty vessel. The public prosecutor, with his drooping moustaches, maintained an air of insolent indifference. A few of the jury appeared to take credit to themselves for sitting through it with patience; while the others, so far as could be observed, did not so much as pretend to listen. The only persons present, in fact, who really took any interest in the summing up of the defence were Aunt Bachissia, Giovanna, and the prisoner; and the longer their advocate talked, the more did these feel that their case was hopelessly lost.

From time to time some new arrival would take one of the seats behind Giovanna, and whenever this happened, she would turn quickly to see if it were Paolo. For some reason she found herself ardently wishing for him; she felt as though his mere presence in the courtroom might help them in some way.

At last the lawyer ceased. Instantly, Costantino arose, and, growing very red in the face, asked if he might speak. “The⁠—the”⁠—said he, pointing in the direction of the advocate⁠—“the gentleman-lawyer has spoken⁠—he has defended me⁠—and I thank him kindly; but he has not spoken the way I could have wished; he did not say⁠—well, he did not say⁠—”

He stopped, breathing hard.

“Add anything to your defence that occurs to you,” said the judge.

The prisoner stood for a moment with his eyes cast down, in an attitude of deep thought. The flush died out of his face, leaving it whiter than before; presently he passed his hand across his forehead with a convulsive movement, and raised his head.

“This is it,” he began in a low tone. “I⁠—I⁠—” but again his voice failed; then, suddenly clenching his fists,