“Nothing would do,” continued Oreste, “but that she must jump into my cab then and there, with only a lace on her head, and she a Signorina! [here the Signore laughed aloud]—and drive straight to Florence, not to one of the small shops, but to the great milliner’s on Tornabuoni, where she bought a hat,—who knows what it cost?—and she bade me take it to Gioja and tell her to wear it when she liked, for there was nothing wicked about it.”
The priest groaned again.
“Only,” added Oreste, with the suspicion of a twinkle, “she bade us say nothing about it, lest you, Reverendo, might think it your duty to lecture the child again; and it was a pity, she said, to make so good a man uncomfortable. So, as she could not wear it openly, we had to find a way under the plate; and as the whole village would have been talking if we went away together, I had to make that little story of a patron. Once outside of Vignola, I wait for Gioja, and there in the olive grove she makes herself into a signora; and on the way home we stop again, and—the signora’s hat and gown stowed away under my seat—my little sposa climbs up beside me and we talk it all over. And then the next day I count my francs, and the folk call me ‘Birbone;’ and the lads think evil of my Gioja because she would never look at them; and we laugh in our sleeves. What does all that matter when one is happy?”
“And so,” said the priest, sternly, “you let all Vignola think your wife has a lover, and say nothing?”
“They have to think something; and isn’t it better they should think she has a lover, Reverendo, than a cappello di signora?”
“Surely,” assented the priest, quickly; “a lover, at least, they can all understand; and only too many of them—Madonna pardon them!—have had; but a signora’s hat nobody in the village has ever had, and they would never pardon Gioja for having. And they have right; Gioja has no business with a signora’s hat, nor you to waste your time and money, as if you would be bambini all your lives. And for you, a man, to make yourself the servant of your wife,—oh, it is shameful, vergognoso!”
“Pardon again, Reverendo, but that, too, you can’t understand. If it is Gioja’s poesia to play the signora,—why, Gioja is my poesia. As for its lasting, altro! the future is long; and if we had others to feed all that might be different. She is only a child herself now; but when the good God sends a child to a child, that makes a woman of her; He himself sees to that. When that comes, she will care nothing to play the signora with her stupid Oreste. All this our Signorina knew; for that night, when the child came to me weeping, and saying how wicked she had been, and begging me to forgive her and marry her at once, at once—I, Signori, who would have married her any moment for years!—it put me in trouble. I had fear to take her like that, and perhaps have her sorry for it later. But I went to our Signorina with her, and told her all; and she looked at us both and said: ‘Marry her, Oreste; you safely may;’ for the Signorina understood. And so—I married her.”
The eyes of the two young men met suddenly, and exchanged across the gulf of position and race one rapid thrill of comprehension. The priest looked half-timidly at both; but perhaps he, too, comprehended something, for he said meekly,—
“After all, I did no harm.”
“Perhaps not,” replied Oreste, with his frank smile; “but that was not your fault, Reverendo. And now, if the Signore and you will excuse me, that was the bell of the Elevation. If Gioja saw you, she would have no more pleasure; and that would be all the more a pity, because it is our last festa here. We are going to live with the Signore and his Signora. Is n’t it so, Signore?”