"I haven't any husband, my dear Aunt Porredda. Ask your son over there."
"My son!" exclaimed the other angrily. "I have no son. He's a child of the devil!"
It almost seemed as though Giovanna had succeeded in throwing the responsibility of her act upon Paolo, because he had won her case for her!
Every one laughed at Aunt Porredda's outbreak, even Minnia, and the servant who entered the room at that moment, carrying the cheese. Notwithstanding her wrath, Aunt Porredda took the dish and handed it politely to her guests.
"Upon my soul," said Aunt Bachissia, carefully cutting herself a slice, and speaking in a tone of gentle melancholy, "you are as good as gold, there is no doubt about that, but—you live at your ease, you have a house like a church, and a husband like a strong tower [Uncle Efes Maria coughed], and you have a circle of stars about you—motioning towards them—so it is easy enough to talk like that. Ah! if you knew once what it meant to be in want, and to look forward to having to beg your bread in your old age! Do you understand? In your old age!"
"Bravo!" cried Paolo. "But I would like to have a clean knife."
"What difference does that make, Bachissia Era?" answered Aunt Porredda. "You are afraid to trust in Divine Providence, and that means that you have lost your faith in God! How do you know whether you will be poor or rich when you are old? Is not Costantino Ledda coming back some day?"
"Yes, to be a beggar too," said Aunt Bachissia coldly.
"And God alone knows whether he ever will come back," observed the young lawyer brutally, taking the knife which the servant held out to him, blade foremost.