‘His reverence will walk himself in procession this afternoon?’ asks a lean peasant.
‘Surely, yes,’ replies the priest. ‘I would not if I could help myself, but the parish is not content unless I go through the farce myself for them. The Virgin grant a breeze, or we shall die of heat under the panoply, with the chin buried in devotion!’
‘Truly!’ laughs another peasant, a pipe in his mouth. ‘It’s poor work being a priest. And a fine sermon it was you preached, though! I wasn’t in church myself, not longer than for my duty at the right minute, but my wife told me! A woman’s not to steal excepting her husband’s drunk, and then it’s her duty to take the gains from his pocket for the household’s benefit. Sound religion! But the women aren’t always to be trusted!’
‘No, no; we preach these things, but you do as best you can. There’s no telling how things’ll turn out. Now, there’s myself even. Preach toleration in church, but, Corpo di Bacco, wouldn’t I have boxed Luigina’s ears, as soon as I was out, if she’d have let me!’ Luigina is the priest’s cousin—a lady of portly frame and of years that waver ’twixt forty-five and fifty. She lives in two brick-floored rooms on the top storey of the parsonage, lives and dresses like a peasant woman, and would fain have more to do with the priest’s household than his old servant permits.
‘Signora Luigina’s no fool,’ laughs the first man; ‘and she’s been a companion to you, your reverence.’
‘Yes—by the Virgin—thirteen years, more is the pity! I’d bury her for nothing, poor soul, and shed a good tear afterwards; but she spoilt those mushrooms all the same, that she cooked me to-day as a favour! Let the oil get outside them, would you believe!’
‘San Pietro—that was enough to drive a saint to swear, much sooner a priest; and they say she leads you a life as bad as Caterina does. But what can a man expect when he keeps women in his house that are not tied by the hand of the law?’
‘What can I do?’ objects the priest, laughing, and nothing depressed! ‘One had to choose a profession. Caterina’s a good servant, and Luigina is as good as most women when she doesn’t force me to a clean shirt. There she is. You there! Have you picked me out those two clean girls to scatter the flowers before the priest’s face in the procession?’
‘I know none so good as myself in the village,’ answers the woman, laughing. ‘Though it’s odd I should scatter flowers before your face—only you’re not the same man, and that’s of course, when once you’re under the banner of the Lord!’
‘What, and do you think He’d put up with an ugly old scarecrow like you! Go to. I’ll find out the girls for myself.’