'This is it,' she said at last in a low and earnest voice. 'It has nothing to do with you or your cousin, personally, nor with your taking possession of Camaldoli, so far as I am concerned. But it is a wild and desolate place, and all through this year a large band of outlaws have been in the forests on the other side of the valley. They would never have hurt my brothers, who are Sicilians and poor, and who did not trouble them either. But you and your cousin are great people, and rich, and not Sicilians, and the mafia will be against you, and will support the brigands if they prevent you from taking possession of Camaldoli. You would be opposed to the mafia; you would bring soldiers there to fight the outlaws. Therefore they will kill you. It is certain. No one ever escapes them. Do you understand? Now you will not go, of course, since I have explained it all.'
Orsino was somewhat puzzled, though it all seemed so clear to her.
'This mafia—what is it?' he asked. 'We hear it spoken of, but we do not any of us really know who is the head of it, nor what it can do.'
'It has no head,' answered the young girl. 'Perhaps it is hard to explain, because you are not a Sicilian. The mafia is not a band, nor anything of that sort. It is the resistance which the whole Sicilian people opposes to all kinds of government and authority. It is, how shall I say? A sentiment, a feeling, a sort of wild love of our country, that is a secret, and will do anything. With us, everybody knows what it is, and evil comes to everyone who opposes it—generally death.'
'We are not much afraid of it, since we have the law on our side,' said Orsino, rather incredulously.
'You are not afraid because you do not understand,' answered Vittoria, her voice beginning to express her anxiety again. 'If you knew what it is, as we know, you would be very much afraid.'
She spoke so simply and naturally that it did not occur to Orsino to be offended at the slight upon his courage.
'We shall take an escort of soldiers to please you,' he said, smiling, and drawing her to him again, as though the discussion were over.