This time mastro Callà had seen that crowd outside the town hall, with their distaffs in their hands, and he dug his feet in worse than a mule. ‘I’m not going unless don Silvestro comes,’ he repeated, eyes bulging. ‘Don Silvestro will find some way out!’

‘I’ll find you a way out,’ replied Betta. ‘So they don’t want a tax on pitch? Well then, leave things as they are.’

‘Wonderful! And where do I get the money from?’

‘Where from? Get the money from the people who’ve got it, zio Crocifisso, for instance, or padron Cipolla, or Peppi Naso.’

‘Wonderful! They’re the councillors!’

‘Then dismiss them and get some others; in any case they won’t be able to keep you on as mayor when no one else wants you. You have to satisfy the majority.’

‘That’s just how women think! As though it were they who keep me where I am. You know nothing. The councillors elect the mayor and they’re the people who have to be the councillors, them and no one else. What do you expect? Beggars from the streets?’

‘Then let the councillors be and dismiss the town clerk, that troublemaker don Silvestro.’

‘Wonderful, and then who will be town clerk? who knows the ropes? You or I, or padron Cipolla, even though he pours out opinions worse than a philosopher.’

Then Betta was stumped at last, and she gave vent to her spleen by unleashing all manner of insults against don Silvestro, who was the boss of the village, and had them all in his pocket.

‘Wonderful,’ repeated Silkworm. ‘Look, if he’s not there I don’t know what to say. I’d like to see you in my shoes.’

At last don Silvestro arrived, with a face harder than a wall, hands behind his back, and humming a little tune. ‘Come now, don’t lose heart, mastro Croce, the world won’t collapse for so little!’ Mastro Croce let himself be led away by don Silvestro, to be seated at the pine council table, with the inkwell in front of him; but the only councillors there were Peppi Naso the butcher, all greasy and red-faced, and afraid of no one in the whole world, and compare Tino Piedipapera. ‘He has nothing to lose!’ shouted la Zuppidda from the doorway, ‘and he comes here to suck the blood of us poor people worse than a leech, because he acts the cat’s paw for this person or that in their dirty deeds. What a pack of thieves and murderers!’

Although he would have liked to play the cool customer because of the dignity of his office, Piedipapera finally lost patience and rose up on his crooked leg, shouting to mastro Cirino, the municipal attendant who was responsible for good order, and had a cap with red on it for that reason when he wasn’t being the sexton too: ‘Get that loudmouth there to shut up!’

‘Quite so — it would suit you if no one spoke, eh, compare Tino?’

‘As if everyone didn’t know what you’re up to, shutting your eyes when padron ’Ntoni’s ’Ntoni comes to talk to your daughter Barbara.’

‘You’re the one who shuts their eyes, you old cuckold! when your wife acts the go-between for la Vespa, who comes to hang around your doorway every morning looking for Alfio Mosca, and you play gooseberry. A fine carry-on! But compare Alfio doesn’t want to know, I can tell you; he’s dreaming of padron ’Ntoni’s Mena, and you lot are wasting the oil in your lamps, whatever la Vespa may say.’

‘I’ll come and give you a good thrashing,’ threatened Piedipapera, and began hobbling around the pine table.

‘To-day things will end badly,’ muttered that parrot mastro Croce.

‘Come now, what sort of carry-on is this? Do you think you’re on the public square?’ shrieked don Silvestro. ‘I’ll throw all you women out if you’re not careful. I’ll soon sort this all out.’

Zuppidda wanted to hear nothing of sorting things out, and she threw herself at don Silvestro, who pushed her out, pulling her by the hair, and then took her aside behind the gate of the smallholding.

‘Well then, what is it that you want?’ he asked her when they were alone, ‘what does it matter to you if they put a tax on pitch? do you or your husband pay it, maybe? or is it the people who have their boats mended, who pay it? You listen to me: your husband is a fool to turn against the town hall and make all this uproar. Now they will have to elect new councillors, instead of padron Cipolla and massaro Mariano, who are useless, and your husband could be put forward.’

‘I know nothing about that,’ replied la Zuppidda, suddenly calming down. ‘I don’t meddle in my husband’s affairs. I know he’s gnawing his hands with rage. I can’t do anything except go and tell him, if it’s certain.’

‘Go and tell him, it’s as certain as God exists, I tell you! Are we decent folk or not, by heavens?’

La Zuppidda ran off to get her husband, who was cowering in the courtyard carding tow, pale as death, and he wouldn’t come out for love or money, shouting that they would cause him to commit some dreadful deed, by God!

Before opening the council, and seeing what the nets held, they would still have to wait for padron Fortunato Cipolla and massaro Filippo the greengrocer, who didn’t seem to be showing up, so that people began to get irritated, and indeed the neighbourhood women had begun spinning, along the low wall of the smallholding.

At last they sent word that they weren’t coming because they were busy; and the council could decide about the tax without them, if they wanted. ‘Just what my daughter Betta said,’ grumbled mastro Croce, the man of straw.

‘Then get your daughter Betta to help you,’ exclaimed don Silvestro. Silkworm did not utter a breath and continued to grumble in a strangled voice.

‘Now,’ said don Silvestro, ‘you’ll see that the Zuppiddos will come of their own accord, to tell me they’re letting me take Barbara, but I’ll play hard to get.’

The session was disbanded without anything being concluded. The town clerk wanted a bit of time to ponder; in the meantime midday had struck and the women had hurried home. When they saw mastro Cirino closing the door and putting the key in his pocket, the few who remained also went about their business here and there, chattering about the insults that had flown between Piedipapera and Zuppidda.

That evening padron ’Ntoni’s ’Ntoni too heard about those words, and by Christ, he wanted to show that fellow Piedipapera that he had done his military service! He met him just as he was coming in from the sciara, near the Zuppiddos’ house, with that fiend’s foot of his, and he began to tell him where he got off, that he was a swine and should think twice before speaking ill of the Zuppiddos and what they did, because it was none of his business. Piedipapera couldn’t contain himself. ‘So you think you’ve come back from so far just to act the braggart round here, do you?’

‘I came to give you a thrashing, if you say anything more.’

At these shouts people had come to their doorways, and a big crowd had gathered; so that they scrapped for real, and Piedipapera, who was no stranger to the fist fight, let himself fall to the ground in a huddle with ’Ntoni Malavoglia, and that way at least it didn’t matter what sort of legs you had, and they thrashed around in the mud, hitting out at each other and biting like Peppi Naso’s dogs, so much so that padron ’Ntoni’s ’Ntoni had to rush into the Zuppiddo’s courtyard, because his shirt was all torn, and Piedipapera was led home as bloody as Lazarus.

‘Now look here,’ shrieked comare Venera again after they had banged the door in the neighbours’ faces, ‘kindly note that in my own house I am mistress to do just as I please. I can give my daughter to whomsoever I want.’

All red in the face, the girl had run into the house, with her heart beating like that of a day-old chick.

‘They half pulled your ear off,’ said compare Turi, carefully pouring water over ’Ntoni’s head. ‘Compare Tino bites worse than a Corsican dog!.

’Ntoni still had blood all over his face, and was burning to do something rash.

‘Listen, comare Venera,’ he then said in front of everybody, ‘personally, if I can’t have your daughter, I won’t marry anyone.’ And the girl was listening from the other room. ‘This isn’t the moment for such talk, compare ’Ntoni; but if your grandfather agrees, I for my part would have you rather than Victor Emanuel himself.’ Meanwhile compare Zuppiddo was sitting silent, and handed him a piece of towelling to dry himself; so that evening ’Ntoni went home well pleased.

But when they heard about the fight with Piedipapera, the poor Malavoglia were expecting the bailiff to arrive from one moment to the next to come and drive them out of their house, since Easter was approaching, and they had hardly got together half of the debt, and that with great difficulty.

‘See what happens when you hang around houses where there are marriageable girls,’ said la Longa to ’Ntoni. ‘Now everyone is talking about your affairs.