He was delighted with the poetry that caressed his ears with the harmony of an incomprehensible song, and occasionally he frowned, drew up his chin, and made it evident that a great mental operation was taking place within him; then he nodded "yes, yes," with a crafty smile, and scratched his head. Then when the signorino started to write so as to show how many things he knew how to do, Jeli could have staid whole days watching him; and suddenly he would look round suspiciously. He could not be persuaded that the words that were said either by him or by Don Alfonso could possibly be repeated on paper, and still more—those things that had not proceeded from their mouths, and he ended with that shrewd smile.
Every new idea which knocked for entrance at his head made him suspicious; he seemed to try it with the wild diffidence of his vajata. But he expressed no wonder at anything in the world; he might have been told that in cities horses rode in carriages,—he would have kept on that mask of oriental indifference which is the dignity of a Sicilian peasant. It would seem as if he intrenched himself instinctively in his ignorance, as if it were the force of poverty. Every time that he remained short of arguments he would repeat,—
"I do not know at all. I am poor," with that obstinate smile that was intended to be shrewd.
He had asked his friend Alfonso to write for him the name of Mara on a piece of paper that he had found somewhere, because it was his habit to pick up whatever he saw lying about and put into his packet of odds and ends. One day, after being rather quiet and looking round anxiously, he said, very gravely,—
"I'm in love with some one."
Alfonso, though he knew how to read, opened his eyes in astonishment.
"Yes," continued Jeli, "massaro Agrippino's daughter Mara, who used to be here; but now they're at Marineo, in that great house in the plain that you can see from the 'plain of the lettighiere' yonder."
"O you're going to get married, then?"
"Yes, when I'm grown up and have six onze a year wages. Mara knows nothing about it."
"Why, haven't you told her?"