"The women were also against his being exiled, so Giacomo Fasca at last made the following proposal:—
"'I think, friends, that he will be sufficiently punished if we saddle him with the duty of keeping Luigi's wife and child—let him pay her half as much as Luigi earned!'
"They discussed the matter at great length and finally settled on that. Giuseppe Cirotta was very pleased to get off so easily. Besides, this decision satisfied all: the matter was not taken into the law courts, it was decided in their own circle and no knives were used.
"We do not like, signor, what they write about our affairs in the papers in a language unfamiliar to us. The words that we can understand occur only here and there, like teeth in an old man's mouth. Besides, we don't like the way the judges talk of us, for they are strangers to us and don't understand our life. They talk of us as if we were savages and they themselves angels of God, who don't know the taste of meat or wine, and don't touch womenkind. We are simple folks and we look on life in a simple way.
"So they decided that Giuseppe Cirotta should keep the wife and child of Luigi Meta.
"The matter however had a different ending.
"When Luigi found out that Cirotta's words were untrue and that his wife was innocent, and when he heard our decision, he wrote her a short note in which he invited her to come home:
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"'Come to me and we shall live happily again. Do not take a farthing from that man and, if you have taken any, throw it in his face! I am guilty before you. Could I have thought that a man would lie in such a matter as love?'
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