Full resolution (JPEG) - On this page / på denna sida - Book II - IX. Palazzo Geraci and Palazzo Corvaja
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286
228 . the miracles of antichrist
in Messina. I placed it with La Felucca, and
Ninet-ta’s boy was there too. One day when I came to La
Felucca she said : ’ Ninetta’s boy is dead.’ First I
• thought only this : ’ O God, if it had been mine !’
So I said to La Felucca: ’ Let my boy be dead, and
let Ninetta’s live.’ I gave La Felucca my silver
comb, and she agreed to it. When you came home
from Messina, I said to you : ’ Let us take a
foster-child ! It has never been well between us. Let us
try to adopt a child !’ You liked it, and I took my
own child. And you have been fond of it, and we
have lived as in paradise."
Even before she had ceased speaking the carabineer
put down the child on the ground. The dark men
silently opened their ranks for him, and he went his
way. But a shiver as from ague passed through
Donna Micaela as she saw the carabineer depart.
He ought to have remained just then, in order to
protect the poor woman. When he went, it was as
if he had said : " She is outside the law, that woman.
Her, I cannot protect! " Every man and woman who
stood there felt the same. " She is outside the law."
One after another they went their way.
Piero stood motionless, looking up. Something
wicked and awful was gathering within him. Ire and
passion filled his soul. As soon as Marcia and he
were left alone, something dreadful would burst forth.
The most terrible of all was that the woman did
nothing to escape her doom. She stood still,
paralyzed by the certainty that her fate was sealed, and
that nothing could change it. She neither begged
nor fled. She crouched together like a dog before
an angry master. The Sicilian women know what
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