“Alas, alas, Donna Elisa,” said Don Matteo, “it is better for you to try to talk to him than for me.”
“Your Reverence, the syndic is a stranger; perhaps he has not heard of the blind.”
“Signor Voltaro has been to him; Father Rossi has been to him; and I too, I too. He answers nothing but that he cannot change what is decided in the town Junta. We all know, Donna Elisa, that the town Junta cannot take back anything. If it has decided that your cat shall hold mass in the Cathedral, it cannot change it.”
Suddenly there was a movement in the church. A large blind man came in. “Father Elia!” the people whispered, “Father Elia!”
Father Elia was the head man of the company of blind singers, who always collected there. He had long white hair and beard, and was beautiful as one of the holy patriarchs.
He, like all the others, went forward to Father Succi. He sat down beside him, and leaned his head against the coffin.
Donna Elisa went up to Father Elia and spoke to him. “Father Elia,” she said, “you ought to go to the syndic.”
The old man recognized Donna Elisa’s voice, and he answered her, in his thick, old-man’s tones:—
“Do you suppose that I have waited to have you say that to me? Don’t you know that my first thought was to go to the syndic?”