Brontu threw himself back in an easy attitude, crossed his legs, and, turning slightly around, showed his teeth as he did when talking to women. "As to that, opinions may differ," he said sharply. "There, for instance, is my mother; she dreamed that he had got the death sentence."
"Oh, no, Brontu! What are you talking about? Penal servitude!"
"Well, it amounts to the same thing. Now, we will talk business."
"Very well, let us talk business, by all means," assented Giacobbe, crossing his legs as well.
A little later the two men, having settled the matter in hand, went off together, Brontu leading the way to the tavern. He himself was not in the least close, and if he never offered a visitor a glass in his own house, it was only not to irritate Aunt Martina. At the tavern, though, he was superb, and on this particular evening he made Giacobbe drink so much, and drank so much himself, that they both became tipsy.
Coming out at last into the silent, deserted street, filled with the odour of the dry fields, they began talking again of Costantino, and Brontu said, with brutal frankness, that he was glad of the sentence.
"Go to the devil!" shouted Giacobbe. "You have no heart!"
"All right, that's it; I have no heart."
"Just because Giovanna wouldn't have you, you are glad to hear of the death, or worse than death, of a brother."