Note: Translator Pauline Bancroft Flach died in 1966, less than 70 years ago. Therefore, this work is protected by copyright, restricting your legal rights to reproduce it. However, you are welcome to view it on screen, as you do now. Read more about copyright.
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PAN EM ET CIR CENSES 203
She dragged herself on the stage and stood face
to face with the crowd. There was no pity. She
sang because they all wished to be amused. That
was the worst. She sang because she was afraid of
them and did not dare not to. She was a foreigner
and alone, and she had no one to protect her, and
she was afraid. And they laughed and laughed.
Screams and cries, crowing and whistling
accompanied the whole aria. No one had mercy on her.
For the first time in her life she felt the need of
mercy.
Well, the next day she resolved to depart. She
could not endure Diamante any longer. But when
she told the advocate, Favara, he implored her to
stay for his sake and made her an offer of marriage.
He had chosen his time well. She said yes, and
was married to him. But after that time she built
no more on her palaces; she made no struggle
against poverty; she cared nothing to be queen in
Diamante. Would you believe it? She never
showed herself on the street; she lived indoors like
a Sicilian.
Her little house stood hidden away behind a big
building, and of herself no one knew anything.
They only knew that she was quite changed. No
one knew whether she was happy or unhappy;
whether she shut herself in because she hated the
people, or because she wished to be as a Sicilian
wife ought to be.
Does it not always end so with a woman ? When
they build their palaces they are never finished.
Women can do nothing that has permanence.
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