The Woman and the Priest/Chapter 9
Paul was seated again at his own table in the little dining-room, lighted by an oil lamp. Behind the ridge, which looked a mountain as seen from the presbytery window, the full moon was rising in the pale sky.
He had invited several of the villagers to come in and keep him company, amongst them the old man with the white beard and the owner of the horse, and they were still sitting there drinking and joking, and telling hunting stories. The old man with the white beard, a hunter himself, was criticizing King Nicodemus because, in his opinion, the old recluse did not conduct his hunting according to the law of God.
"I don't want to speak ill of him in his last hour," he was saying; "but to tell the truth, he went out hunting simply as a speculation. Now last winter he must have made thousands of lire by marten skins alone. God allows us to shoot animals, but not to exterminate them! And he used to snare them, too, and that is forbidden, because animals feel pain just as we do, and the hours they lie caught in the snares must be terrible. Once I myself, with these very eyes, I saw a snare where a hare had left her foot. Do you understand what that means? The hare had been caught in the snare and had gnawed the flesh away all round her foot, and had broken her leg off to get free. And what did Nicodemus do with his money, after all? He hid it, and now his grandson will drink it all in a few days."
"Money is made to be spent," said the owner of the horse, a man much given to boasting; "I myself, for instance, I have always spent freely and enjoyed myself, without hurting anyone. Once at our festival, having nothing else to do, I stopped a man who sold silk reels and happened to be passing with a load of his goods; I bought the whole lot, then I set them rolling about on the piazza and ran after them, kicking them here and there and everywhere! In one instant the whole crowd was after me, laughing and yelling, and the boys and young men, and even some of the older men began to imitate me. That was a game that's not forgotten yet! Every time the old priest saw me he used to shout from ever so far: "Hallo, Pasquale Masia, haven't you any reels to set rolling to-day?"
All the guests laughed at the tale, only Paul seemed absent-minded and looked pale and tired. The old man with the white beard, who was observing him with reverent affection, winked at his companions to suggest an immediate departure. It was time to leave the servant of God to his holy solitude and well-merited repose.
The guests rose from their seats all together and took respectful leave of their host; and Paul found himself alone, between the flickering flame of the oil lamp and the calm splendour of the moon that shone in through the high window, while the sound of the heavy iron-shod shoes of his departing guests echoed down the deserted street.
It was yet early to go to bed, and although he was utterly worn out and his shoulders ached with fatigue, as though he had been bearing a heavy yoke all the day, he had no thought of going up to his own room. His mother was still in the kitchen: he could not see her from where he sat, but he knew that she was watching as on the previous night.
The previous night! He felt as if he had been suddenly awakened out of a long sleep, and the distress of his return home from the house of Agnes, and his thoughts in the night, the letter, the Mass, the journey up the mountain, the villagers' demonstration, had all been only a dream. His real life was beginning again now: he had but to take a step, a dozen steps, to open the door … and go back to her.… His real life was beginning again.
"But perhaps she is not expecting me any longer. Perhaps she will never expect me again!"
Then he felt his knees trembling and terror took hold of him again, not at the thought of going back to her, but at the thought that she might have accepted her fate and be already beginning to forget him.
Then he realized that in the depths of his heart the hardest thing to bear since he came down from the mountain had been this—not knowing anything about her, her silence, her vanishing out of his life.
This was the veritable death, that she should cease to love him.
He buried his face in his hands and tried to bring her image before his mind's eye, then he began to reproach her for those things for which she might justly have reproached him.
"Agnes, you cannot forget your promises! How can you forget them? You held my wrists in your two strong hands and said to me: 'We are bound to each other for ever, in life and in death.' Is it possible that you can forget? You said, you know…"
His fingers gripped at his collar, for he was suffocating with his distress.
"The devil has caught me in his snare," he thought, and remembered the hare who had gnawed off her own foot.
He drew a deep breath, rose from his chair, and took up the lamp. He determined to conquer his will, to gnaw his own flesh also if thereby he could only free himself. Now he decided to go up to his room, but as he moved towards the hall he saw his mother sitting in her accustomed place in the silent kitchen, and beside her was Antiochus fast asleep. He went to the door:
"Why is that boy still here?" he asked.
His mother looked at him hesitatingly: she would have preferred not to answer, but to have hidden Antiochus behind her wide skirts in order that Paul should not wait up any longer, but go to his room and to bed. Her faith in him was now completely restored, but she too thought of the devil and his snares. At this moment, however, Antiochus woke up and remembered very well why he was still waiting there, in spite of the fact that the woman had several times asked him to go.
"I was waiting here because my mother is expecting a visit from you," he explained.
"But is this a time of night to go paying visits?" protested the priest's mother. "Come now, be off with you, and tell her that Paul is tired and will go and see her to-morrow."
She spoke to the boy, but she was looking at her son: she saw his glassy eyes fixed upon the lamp, but his eyelids quivered like the wings of a moth in a candle.
Antiochus got up with an expression of deep disappointment.
"But my mother is expecting him; she thinks it's something important."
"If it was anything important he would go and tell her at once. Come, be off with you!"
She spoke sharply, and as Paul looked at her his eyes lit up again with quick resentment: he saw that his mother was afraid lest he should go out again, and the knowledge filled him with unreasoning anger. He banged the lamp down on the table again and called to Antiochus:
"We will go and see your mother."
In the hall, however, he turned and added:
"I shall be back directly, mother; don't fasten the door."
She had not moved from where she sat, but when the two had left the house she went to peep through the half-open door and saw them cross the moonlit square and enter the wineshop, which was still lighted up. Then she went back to the kitchen and began her vigil as on the previous night.
She marvelled at herself to find that she was no longer afraid of the old priest reappearing; it had all been a dream. At the bottom of her heart, however, she did not feel at all certain that the ghost would not come back and demand his mended socks.
"I have mended them all right," she said aloud, thinking of those she had mended for her son. And she felt that even if the ghost did come back she would be able to hold her own with him and keep on friendly terms.
Complete silence reigned all round. Outside the window the trees shone silver in the bright moonlight, the sky was like a milky sea, and the perfume of the aromatic shrubs penetrated even into the house. And the mother herself was tranquil now, though she hardly knew why, seeing that Paul might yet fall again into sin; but she no longer felt the same terror of it. She saw again in her mind's eye the lashes trembling on his cheeks, like those of a child about to cry, and her mother's heart melted with tenderness and pity.
"And why, oh Lord, why, why?"
She dared not complete her question, but it remained at the bottom of her heart like a stone at the bottom of a well. Why, oh Lord, was Paul forbidden to love a woman? Love was lawful for all, even for servants and herdsmen, even for the blind and for convicts in prison; so why should Paul, her child, be the only one to whom love was forbidden?
Then again the consciousness of reality forced itself on her. She remembered the words of Antiochus, and was ashamed of being less wise than a boy.
"They themselves, the youngest amongst the priests, asked permission to live chaste and free, apart from women."
Moreover, her Paul was a strong man, in no wise inferior to his ancient predecessors. He would never give way to tears; his eyelids would close over eyes dry as those of the dead, for he was a strong man.
"I am growing childish!" she sobbed.
She felt as if she had grown twenty years older in that one long day of wearing emotions: each hour that passed had added to the burden she bore, each minute had struck a blow upon her soul as the hammer of the stone-breaker struck upon the heaps of broken rock there behind the ridge. So many things now seemed clear to her, different from on the previous day. The figure of Agnes came before her, with the proud look that concealed all she really felt.
"She is strong too," thought the mother; "she will hide everything."
Then slowly she rose from her chair and began to cover the fire with ashes, banking it up carefully so that no sparks could fly out and set fire to anything near: then she shut the house door, for she knew Paul always carried a key with him. She stamped about loudly, as though he could hear her across the square, and believe her firm footsteps to be an outward sign of her inward assurance.
She felt, however, that this assurance was not so very firm after all. But then what is really firm in this life? Neither the base of the mountains nor the foundations of the churches, for an earthquake may overthrow them both. Thus she felt sure of Paul for the future, and sure of herself, but always with an underlying dread of the unknown which might chance to supervene. And when she reached her bedroom she dropped wearily into a chair, wondering whether it would not have been better after all to leave the front door open.
Then she got up and began to untie her apron string; but it had twisted into a knot over which she lost patience at last, and went to fetch a pair of scissors from her work-basket. She found the kitten curled up asleep inside the basket, and the scissors and reels were all warm from contact with its tiny body; and somehow the touch of the living thing made her repent of her impatience, and she went back to the lamp, and drawing the knot in front of her she succeeded at last in untying it. With a sigh of relief she slowly undressed, carefully folding her garments one by one on the chair, first, however, taking the keys out of her apron pocket and laying them in a row on the table like a respectable family all asleep. Thus her masters had taught her in her youth to cultivate order and tidiness, and she still obeyed the old instructions.
She sat down again, half undressed, her short chemise displaying thin brown legs that might have been made of wood, and she yawned with weariness and resignation. No, she would not go downstairs again; her son should come home and find the door closed, and see from that fact that his mother had full confidence in him. That was the right way to manage him, show that you trusted him absolutely. Nevertheless, she was on the alert, and listened for the least sound; not in the same way as on the previous night, but still she listened. She drew off her shoes and placed them side by side, like two sisters who must keep each other company even during the night, and went on murmuring her prayers and yawning, yawning with weariness and resignation, and with sheer nervousness, too.
Whatever could Paul have to say to Antiochus's mother? The woman had by no means a good reputation, she lent money on usury and was commonly supposed to be a procuress too. No, Paul's mother could not understand it. Then she blew out the candle, snuffed the smoking wick with her fingers and got into bed, but could not bring herself to lie down.
Presently she thought she heard a step in her room. Was it the ghost come back? She was filled with a horrible fear lest he should come up to the bed and take hold of her; for a moment her blood froze in her veins, then surged to her heart as a people in tumult rushes through the streets of its city to the principal square. Then she recovered herself and was ashamed of her fear, only caused, she was sure, by the wicked doubts she had entertained of her Paul.
No, those doubts were all ended: never again would she inquire into the very smallest of his actions; it was her place to keep quietly in the background, as she was now, in her little room fit only for a servant. She lay down and drew the bedclothes over her, covering her ears, too, so that she might not hear whether Paul came home or not; but in her inner consciousness she felt all the same, she felt that he was not coming home, that he had been carried off by some one against his will, as one drawn reluctantly into a dance.
Nevertheless she felt quite sure of him; sooner or later he would manage to escape and come home. Anyhow, she was resting quietly under the bedclothes, though not yet asleep, and she had a confused impression that she was still trying to undo the knot in her apron string. Then the faint buzzing in her ears beneath the coverlet turned gradually into the murmuring of the crowd in the square beneath her window, and farther off still the murmuring of a people who lamented, and yet whilst lamenting laughed and danced and sang. Her Paul was there in the midst of them, and above them all in some high, far place, a lute was being softly played. Perhaps it was God Himself playing to the dance of men.