be let to want, neither for food nor for shelter; no, nor for communication with their friends at home,” he added, looking hard at Beppo, with so meaning a glance that it was all but a wink.
“And your reverence thinks that it would not be for a very long time—that those who go out into the hills will be able to return to their homes after awhile?” asked Beppo, musingly.
“Of course. It stands to reason. Specially those who live not in the towns, but in out-of-the-way places like this. Why, we are almost among the hills, as you may say, here. As soon as this conscription business is over, the troops will quit the country,—go to be shot down by the Austrian cannon, or to cut the throats of their brothers in Naples, or to be led to sacrilege against Rome, and be struck dead, perhaps, in the horrible act: what do I know. They will be marched away; and then the country will be quiet, till God sees fit in His mercy to restore the lawful and rightful government; and when that day comes, as come it surely will before long, those who have refused at any cost to bear arms against their Holy Father will have cause to bless themselves, and thank their good fortune.”
“And your reverence thinks there would be means of holding communication with—with one’s friends at home, or—or in the towns?”
“No doubt about that,” said the priest, again looking, with peculiar intelligence, hard at Beppo. “We shall take care about that. There would be no lack of means of communication. Any man in the hills for this cause might know, day by day, if he cared about it—which is hardly likely—what was the news in the towns.”
“That would be a great thing, certainly,” said Beppo, meditating, and seeming to speak more to himself than to the priest.
“What! I suppose your visit to Signor Sandro’s house yesterday has made you wish to hear from him again, eh?”
“Yes!—no! That is, your reverence, not from him particularly,” replied Beppo, far too simple to tell a lie, even when it was put into his mouth for him by the person to whom it was to be told.
“Ah! I see!” said the priest, pretending to misunderstand him; “not from him, perhaps. I am told that Lisa Bertoldi is becoming one of the most charming girls in Fano—immensely improved of late, and greatly sought after. No wonder, with her expectations. It is a pity her father should have let some of those scamps of officers come round her. But that will be all over as soon as they are out of the country—pests as they are! But Lisa is a prudent girl, and is very safe not to commit herself.” (The priest did not guess that Lisa had been perfectly confidential with Beppo on the subject of her loves with the captain of Bersaglieri.) “Would to Heaven,” he continued, “that as much could be said for that unfortunate Giulia! I have almost reproached myself for having advised that the proposal of Signor Sandro to send her to Fano should be accepted for her. But God knows I acted for the best, and to the best of my judgment. Who could have thought that a girl so brought up would have gone to the bad so shamefully, and that in so short a time?” And the priest lifted his hands and eyes to heaven, or, at least, to the ceiling of the farmhouse kitchen, as he spoke. “But the fact is,” he added, dropping his eyes with a meek, resigned sigh, “that when a girl is thoroughly bad nothing can save her. A heartless, false girl is, and must be, lost, whether in town or country.”
The supper, of which Don Evandro had partaken with the family, had been finished long ago. It had consisted merely of the minestra, a bit of cheese afterwards, and a flask of the farmer’s Bella Luce wine. But Signora Sunta had been assailed by no false shame, and had made no efforts to increase her bill of fare, and no boasting excuses to the priest any more than to one of the family. For he was not a guest from the city, but a fellow-villager, who was one of themselves. The supper therefore had not taken long. And as soon as it was over, la Sunta had without apology taken up the one lumino, or tall brass Roman lamp, which had stood on the supper-table, and had gone with it about her household affairs, leaving her husband and sons and their guest to smoke their cigars and have their talk by the light of the May moon which streamed in through the open kitchen-door. Old Paolo had fallen asleep soon after the conversation had reached the point at which it had been authoritatively decided that it would be wicked of him to pay out money. Since that, the talk had been entirely between Beppo and the priest, and Carlo had been an attentive listener. It was fortunate for Beppo that they were sitting so nearly in the dark, for he felt that it would have been impossible otherwise for him to have concealed from the ever-watchful eye of the priest the agitation and misery which the last words of the latter were causing him. They did but confirm his own impressions of the day before. But then those impressions had been the result of indignation—of the things which he had seen with his eyes! His eyes no longer saw them! His indignation had begun to wane! The impressions had become less forcible and distinct. It was becoming more possible for him to persuade himself that he exaggerated matters—that he himself had been to blame—that there might still be a possibility of hope for him, in short. But now the words of Don Evandro rudely threw down again all the fabric he was once more striving to raise, and cut off like a blighting March wind the new green shoots that his love, which would not be killed, was again putting forth. The pain was very agonising to him, and it was a relief to him that it was too dark for the priest to see his features.
In truth, the darkness concealed little or nothing from the priest’s knowledge, if it did from his eyes. He knew perfectly well the effect of what he was saying, as well as the surgeon knows the sensations of the patient under his knife.
But the operation was not over—Beppo had more to suffer yet.
“What mischief, then, has Giulia been getting into in the city, your reverence?” asked Carlo. “I am not surprised, for one, for I always thought her a bad one. I never knew her to stay for the litanies after vespers, not once last year; and I