Then she stood quite crushed that this should meet her when she came to Catania for the first time in twelve years. “Lord God,” she said, “is there any meaning in it?”
At home, in Diamante, no one would ever have taken the trouble to tell her what was going on. Was it not destiny that she should be here on the very day of the trial?
“Listen, Donna Alfari,” she said; “you may do as you like, but I must go to the court.”
There was a decision about Giannita. Nothing could disturb her. “Do you not understand that it is for this, and not for your sake, that God has induced you to take me with you to Catania?” she said to Rosa Alfari.
Giannita did not doubt for a moment that there was something supernatural in it all.
Rosa Alfari must needs let her go, and she found her way to the Palace of Justice. She stood among the street boys and riff-raff, and saw Cavaliere Palmeri on the bench of the accused. He was a fine gentleman, with a white, pointed beard and moustache. Giannita recognized him.
She heard that he was condemned to six months’ imprisonment, and Giannita thought she saw even more plainly that she had come there as an emissary from God. “Now my god-sister must need me,” she thought.
She went out into the street again and asked her way to the Palazzo Palmeri.
On the way a carriage drove by her. She looked up, and her eyes met those of the lady who sat in the carriage. At the same moment something told her that this was her god-sister. She who was driving was pale and bent and had beseeching eyes. Giannita loved her from the first sight. “It is you who have given me pleasure many times,” she said, “because I expected pleasure from you. Now perhaps I can pay you back.”