“For you must know, Donna Micaela, that in Palermo they do not bury the dead in the ground. They carry them to the monastery of the Capucins, and the monks hang them up in their vaults. Ah, there are so many hanging in those vaults!—so many ladies, dressed in silk and cloth of silver; so many noble gentlemen, with orders on their breasts; and so many priests, with cloak and cap over skeleton and skull.
“The young duke followed his advice. He went to the Capucin monastery, took the piece of gold from his father’s mouth and bought the horse with it.
“But you understand that the king had only sent his servant with the horse in order to find out if any one still had any money. And now the duke was taken before the king. ‘How does it happen that you still have gold pieces?’ said Guglielmo the Wicked.—‘Sire, it was not mine; it was my father’s.’ And he told how he had got the piece of gold. ‘It is true,’ said the king. ‘I had forgotten that the dead still had money.’ And he sent his servants to the Capucins and had them take all the gold pieces out of the mouths of the dead.”
Here old Master Pamphilio finished his story. And now Donna Concetta turned to Donna Micaela with wrathful eyes. “It is you who are out with the horse,” she said.
“Am I? am I?”
“You, you, Donna Micaela! The government will say: ‘They are building a railway in Diamante. They must be rich.’ And they will increase our taxes. And God knows that we cannot pay the tax with which we are already loaded down, even if we should go and plunder our ancestors.”
Donna Micaela tried to calm her.
“They have sent you out to find out if we still have any money. You are spying for the rich; you are in league with the government. Those bloodsuckers in Rome have paid you.”
Donna Micaela turned away from her.