Don Antonio repeated his remark with a hand on his heart and a challenging expression, “My testimony is ocular! Entirely ocular.” One evening he came, walking with great effort and carefully, painstakingly prepared to sit down; he had “a cold, the length of the spine!” Another evening he arrived with the right cheek slightly bruised; he had fallen “underhand”; in other words, he had slipped and struck his face on the ground. Thus were the conversations of these gatherings made up. Don Giovanni Ussorio, always present, had the airs of a proprietor; every so often he approached Violetta with ostentation and murmured something familiarly in her ear. Long intervals of silence occurred, during which Don Grisostomo Troilo blew his nose and Don Federico Sicoli coughed like a consumptive, holding both hands to his mouth and then shaking them.
The opera-singer revived the conversation with accounts of her triumphs at Corfu, Ancona and Bari. Little by little she grew animated, abandoned herself to her imagination; with discreet reserve she spoke of princely “amours,” of royal favours, of romantic adventures; she thus evoked all of those confused recollections of novels read at other times, and trusted liberally to the credulity of her listeners. Don Giovanni at these times turned his eyes upon her full of inquietude, almost bewildered; moreover experiencing a singular irritation that had an indistinct resemblance to jealousy. Violetta at length ended with a stupid smile and the conversation languished anew.
Then Violetta went to the piano and sang. All listened with profound attention; at the end they applauded. Then Don Brattella arose with the flute. An immeasurable melancholy took hold of his listeners at that sound, a kind of swooning of body and soul. They rested with heads lowered almost to their breasts in attitudes of sufferance. At last all left, one after the other. As they took the hand of Violetta a slight scent from the strong perfume of musk remained on their fingers, and this excited them further. Then, once more in the street, they reunited in groups, holding loose discourse. They grew inflamed, lowered their voices and were silent if anyone drew near. Softly they withdrew from beneath the Brina palace to another part of the square. There they set themselves to watching Violetta’s windows, still illuminated. Across the panes passed indistinct shadows; at a certain time the light disappeared, traversed two or three rooms and stopped in the last window. Shortly, a figure leaned out to close the shutters. Those spying thought they recognised in it the figure of Don Giovanni. They still continued to discuss beneath the stars and from time to time laughed, while giving one another little nudges, and gesticulating. Don Antonio Brattella, perhaps from the reflection of the city-lamps, seemed a greenish colour. The parasites, little by little in their discourse spit out a certain animosity toward the opera-singer, who was plucking so gracefully their lord of good times. They feared lest those generous feasts might be in peril; already Don Giovanni was more sparing of his invitations.
“It will be necessary to open the eyes of the poor fellow. An adventuress! Bah! She is capable of making him marry her. Why not? And then what a scandal!”
Don Pompeo Nervi, shaking his large calf’s head, assented:
“You are right! You are right! We must bethink ourselves.”
Don Nereo Pica, “The Cat,” proposed a way, conjured up schemes; this pious man, accustomed to the secret and laborious skirmishes of the sacristy was crafty in the sowing of discord.
Thus these complainers treated together and their fat speeches only returned again into their bitter mouths. As it was spring the foliage of the public gardens smelt and trembled before them with white blossoms and through the neighbouring paths they saw, about to disappear, the figures of loosely-dressed prostitutes.
V
When, therefore, Don Giovanni Ussorio, after having heard from Rosa Catana of the departure of Violetta Kutufa, re-entered his widower’s house and heard his parrot humming the air of the butterfly and the bee, he was seized by a new and more profound discouragement.