"I was just about to give your grandson a box on the ear," said Aunt Bachissia.
"And why were you going to do that, my soul? Come now, sit down, all of you; Giovanna, here; Dr. Porreddu, over there."
The student threw himself back full-length on the bed, stretched out his arms, lifted his legs high in air, dropped them again, sat up, and jumped to his feet with a yawn.
The children and Giovanna began to laugh again.
"A little gymnastic exercise does one good. Great Lord! how I shall sleep to-night! My bones feel as though they had lost all their joints. How tall you have grown, Grazia; you look like a bean-pole."
The girl reddened and dropped her eyes; while Aunt Bachissia thrust out her lips, annoyed at the student's lack of interest, as well as at the general indifference to Costantino's fate. To be sure, Giovanna herself had apparently forgotten, and it was only when Aunt Porredda placed before her a bountiful helping of macaroni covered with fragrant red gravy, that she suddenly recollected herself; her face clouded over, and she refused to eat.
"There now! what did I tell you?" cried Aunt Porredda. "She is crazy, absolutely crazy! Why can't you eat? What has eating your supper to-night to do with the sentence to-morrow?"
"Come, come," said Aunt Bachissia crossly. "Don't be foolish, don't go to work and spoil these good people's pleasure."
"A brave heart," said Uncle Efes Maria pompously—fastening his napkin under his chin and seeing an opportunity for a learned observation—"a brave heart defies fate, as Dante Alighieri says. Come now, Giovanna, prove yourself a true flower of the mountains; more enduring than the rocks themselves. Time softens all things."