We laughed hastily.
“But it is time to cut your beard and hang your rifle on the wall,” Perolli suggested. “There is a free Albanian government now.”
“But not a free Albania,” said the bandit. “The government forgets that, and sits in council with the Powers that sold us to Italy and gave us to Serbia. Have you forgotten Kossova and a million of your brothers who are slaves to the Serbs?”
“I am of Ipek,” Perolli answered him. “Nevertheless, I am first a Shqiptar and second a man of Kossova. And I remember our proverb that says, ‘Better an egg to-day than a chicken next year.’”
“We have also a saying, ‘Better the nightingale once than the blackbird every day,’” replied the bandit.
“Let it be. ‘Every sheep hangs by her own leg,’” Perolli retorted, rising.
The honors were with him. For the moment, the bandit could think of no proverb which would be a weapon, and could only reply to our courteous farewells by wishing us smooth trails.
“The good man of yesterday becomes a burden to-day and a danger to-morrow,” said Perolli, as we went slowly along the ledge of trail. “Why is it that our minds do not change as rapidly as the world changes around us? These mountain men will cling to their rifles, though the time is past when killing will solve our problems. Stupidity! But sometimes I think the whole world is stupid.”
We agreed with little assenting sounds, our minds too much occupied with the difficulty of the way to spend energy on words. We were absorbed in the narrow, slippery trail running rust red along a cliff that wept iron. Only when we paused for breath did we see the beautiful valley of the Lumi Shala beneath us. The rain was falling gently now, a wavering veil of gray chiffon over the mountains that ran a scale of paling blues to the white peaks in the west. Below them little fields were green, burgeoning woods were faintly rainbow misted with colors of new leaves, and there was a foam of plum blossom and a sudden rosy note from a solitary peach tree.
We looked in silence. And when we resumed our toiling way, Perolli began to sing. It was a song with springtime in it, a song like the valley of the Lumi Shala, an Albanian song of strangely pitched half notes and indescribable transitions, breaking at intervals into the burbling melody of a bird’s throat. We listened entranced; we begged him to sing it again.