The Ninth Man/Chapter 7
CHAPTER VII
I FELT that I must leave the house. It was noon, San Moglio sat at meat, but I had stomach for neither meat nor drink this day, I walked up the hill and sought solitude in a little-frequented place hardly larger than a handkerchief at San Moglio's summit. In the shadow of a church portico sat Brother Agnello, and he threw crumbs to the birds. My heart was gladdened that there were those who could feed birds in the sunshine. I sat myself beside him, and a little blond child came up and leaned herself against his knees and reached up shyly for a bit of bread. And some other children joined us, some shyly, some boldly. When all the bread was gone but the last bit, the boldest two quarreled for it, and one snatched it, at which the other wept and said:
"I shall tell my big brother what you have done to me and he will kill you with his black ballot."
"Ah, but my father," said the other, "will kill him first, for he, too, has a black ballot."
"Nannetta has one also," piped one of the little children.
"And who will Nannetta kill?"
And here, walking with importance, came another child and three smaller children following her at a distance, and those about the knees of Brother Agnello called out, "And who will you kill, Nannetta?"
Then she says, with the manners of an heiress: "That is not yet decided. My aunts and mother talk about it all the long day, as do my father and his brothers, and no two of them agree." Her pockets were full of sweet cakes, and these she distributed.
But a big, quiet boy, who had borne himself like a man among his inferiors, spoke up and said, "Nannetta gives herself airs; but there are other children who have the ballot." And he pressed his lips together as one who would say no more.
"He himself has it," cried a child, and he pointed a chubby finger at his brother. Julio himself has it. I saw him, as he thought I slept, bring it from between his mattresses and look at it." At this they crowded about Julio.
"And what will you do with it, Julio? And what doth thy father say?"
"Hist!" said he. "My father does not know, nor my mother. I shall kill my master with it, and then I shall be free. Moreover, those children who now use their ballots as their fathers and mothers say are fools, for they must undoubtedly some day work and be bound over as apprentices, and they had better kill their masters."
There being no more bread, and the noon hour being past, the children ran away, all but the little blond girl, who had remained pressed close to Brother Agnello's side. And now when they were all gone she lifted the skirt of her pinafore and groped in her pocket, bringing from it a ballot which she mutely showed to him; and he, feeling in his scrip brought out its fellow, and the two smiled at each other like children who compare their marbles.
"No one knows," she whispered.
"She lives with her grandmother," Brother Agnello then said to me, "and the old dame is deaf and blind and the little maid too shy to talk to any."
"And what shall you do with yours?" he asked her, gently.
She shook her head. "I know not. And you with yours?" she made bold to answer.
"With mine I shall kill myself," said he, in his simple way, "so no blood shall be upon my head."
"Then I, too. Then I, too!" §he said, clapping her hands. "I, too, will kill myself like you, Agnello!"
At this he was troubled. Then he said: "Why, no! I am as one already dead, so do you cast your ballot for me, and you shall live and not one more be killed besides. So you shall be innocent."
With that a light as from heaven streamed over his face, and the little maid clapped her hands, crying:
"That I will do! That I will do!" and glad enough that she need not kill herself. But he did not hear her. And I went away, leaving him as one who listens to the voice of God's angels speaking.