140
IN MAREMMA.
were with all those dead people under the ground, whose gold outlived them.
Her great eyes looked up through the unglazed window to red Arcturus shining in the constellation of Boötes.
'Do the dead sleep all day in the dark in the earth and at night shine in there?' she asked, gazing at silvery Spica hanging above the sea.
Joconda pushed her to her bed.
'Leave the dead alone. You have just begun to live. Get you to bed, for it is late and oil is dear. If you had brought a little bit of the gold now—God forbid I should tell you to steal, but the dead are dead and it could not have harmed them.'
The child lay down and turned her face to the wall: her cheeks were wet with tears.
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