At last he grew impatient and cried out, "I admit it, I tell you. What's the good of going on?"
The next witness was the Chief of Police. Commendatore Angelelli was called to prove that the cause of the revolt was not the dearness of bread but the formation of subversive associations, of which the "Republic of Man" was undoubtedly the strongest and most virulent. The prisoner, however, was not one of the directing set, and the police knew him only as a sort of watch-dog for the Honourable Rossi.
"The man's a fool. Why don't you go on with the trial?" cried Bruno.
"Silence," cried the usher of the court, but the prisoner only laughed out loud.
Roma looked at Bruno again. There was something about the man which she had never seen before, something more than the mere spirit of defiance, something terrible and tremendous.
"Francesca Maria Mariotti," cried the usher, and the old deaf mother of Bruno's wife was brought into court. She wore a coloured handkerchief on her head as usual, and two shawls over her shoulders. Being a relative of the prisoner, she was not sworn.
"Your name and your father's name?" said the president.
"Francesca Maria Mariotti," she answered.
"I said your father's name."
"Seventy-five, your Excellency."