“Who says I know Gaspare?”
The way in which she pronounced his name revealed to Hermione a former intimacy between them.
“Ruffo says so.”
The parrot was quite at the edge of the board now, listening apparently with cold intensity to every word that was being said. And Hermione felt that behind the kitchen door the two women were straining their ears to catch the conversation. Was the whole world listening? Was the whole world coldly, cruelly intent upon her painful effort to come out of darkness into—perhaps a greater darkness?
“Ruffo says so. Ruffo told me so.”
“Boys say anything.”
“Do you mean it is not true?”
Maddalena’s face was now almost devoid of expression. She had set her knees wide apart and planted her hands on them.
“Do you mean that?” repeated Hermione.
“Boys—”