I’m telling you, la Vespa wants him to get his hands on her!’

Everyone had their contribution to make on the subject of zio Crocifisso, who was always bleating and groaning like Christ crucified between the thieves, and yet he had pots of money, because one day when the old man had been ill, la Zuppidda had seen a coffer under the bed as long as your arm.

La Longa felt the forty onze from the lupin debt weighing her down, and changed the subject, because even walls have ears, and you could hear zio Crocifisso talking nearby with don Giammaria, as they walked through the square, so that even la Zuppidda broke off the vituperations that she was casting in his direction, to greet him.

Don Silvestro was cackling away, and his way of laughing got on the chemist’s nerves, though in fact the chemist had never been endowed with much patience anyway, and he left that virtue to donkeys and people who were satisfied with the revolution as it stood.

‘Precisely, you’ve never had any patience, you wouldn’t know where to put it,’ don Giammaria shouted at him; and don Franco, who was a small man, would rise to the bait and address rough words to the priest, words which could be heard from one end of the square to the other, in the dark. Dumb-bell, hard as stone, was shrugging his shoulders, and took care to repeat guardedly that it didn’t matter a hoot to him, he minded his own business. ‘And don’t tell me it’s not your business if nobody pays a penny towards the Brotherhood of the Good Death,’ don Giammaria said to him. ‘When it’s a question of putting their hands into their pockets, people become a pack of heathen, worse than the chemist, and cross to the other side when they see the Brotherhood’s coffers!’

From his shop don Franco sniggered aloud, trying to imitate don Silvestro’s maddening laugh. But the chemist was one of Them, as everyone knew; and don Giammaria shouted to him from the square: ‘You’d find the money all right, if it were for schools and lamps!’

The chemist held his tongue, because his wife had appeared at the window; and when he was far enough away not to fear being overheard by don Silvestro, the town clerk, who also pocketted a bit of a salary as an elementary school teacher, zio Crocifisso said that it didn’t matter to him.

But in his day they hadn’t had all those lamps, nor all those schools; you didn’t force the horse to drink, and everyone was the better off for it.

‘You never went to school; but you can manage your business.’

‘And I know my catechism,’ added zio Crocifisso, to return the compliment.

In the heat of the dispute don Giammatria, missed his usual way across the square almost tripped and, God forgive him, let slip a bad word.

‘If only they’d light their precious light, at least!’

‘In this day and age you have to look after yourself,’ zio Crocifisso pronounced.

Don Giammaria tugged him by the sleeve of his jacket every time he wanted to say something disparaging about this person or that, in the middle of the square, there in the dark; about the lamplighter who stole the oil, about don Silvestro who turned a blind eye to it, about the catspaw of a mayor who let himself be led by the nose. Now that he worked for the municipality, mastro Cirino was a most unreliable sexton, ringing the angelus only when he had nothing else to do, and the communion wine he purchased was reminiscent of the kind which Jesus Christ had had on the cross, it was a real sacrilege. Dumb bell kept on nodding out of habit, though it was completely dark and they couldn’t see each other at all, and don Giammaria reviewed his victims one by one, saying that so and so was a thief, so and so a villain, so and so a fire-brand.

‘Have you heard Piedipapera talking with padron Malavoglia and padron Cipolla? He’s another of the gang, I tell you! A rabble-rouser, with that lame leg!’ And when he saw him hobbling across the square he gave him a wide berth, but followed him with a suspicious stare, to find out what he might be up to hobbling along like that. ‘He’s got the devil’s own foot,’ he would mutter. Zio Crocifisso shrugged his shoulders and repeated that he was a decent fellow, and wouldn’t be drawn. ‘Padron Cipolla, now there’s another idiot and a windbag! letting himself be swindled by Piedipapera… and padron ’Ntoni will be falling for it too, before long… you have to be prepared for anything in this day and age!’

Decent folk minded their own business, zio Crocifisso repeated. Meanwhile compare Tino was holding forth like a statesman seated on the steps of the church; ‘Now you listen to me: before the revolution it was quite another matter. Now the fish have got wise to things, let me tell you!’

‘No, no, the anchovies sense the north-easter twenty-four hours before it arrives,’ replied padron ’Ntoni; ‘that’s how it’s always been; the anchovy has more sense than the tunny. Now they are fishing them out in shoals beyond the Capo dei Mulini, with fine-meshed nets.’

‘I’ll tell you what the matter is,’ compare Fortunato suggested. ‘It’s those wretched steamers coming and going, and stirring up the water with their wheels. What can you expect, the fish take fright and move off. That’s what it is.’

La Locca’s son was listening open-mouthed, and scratched his head. ‘Well done,’ he said after a moment. ‘If that were true, the steamers would have scared the fish away at Syracuse too, or Messina. But they bring fish from there on the railway by the ton.’

‘Sort it out yourselves then,’ said padron Cipolla, nettled. ‘It’s not my problem, I couldn’t care less. I’ve got my smallholding and my vines to bring in my daily bread.’

And Piedipapera administered a firm clout to la Locca’s son, to teach him manners. ‘Blockhead! Hold your tongue when your elders are talking!’

The young lout went off bawling and hitting his head with his clenched fists, because everyone took him for a blockhead just on account of being la Locca’s son. Sniffing the air, padron ’Ntoni commented:

‘If the north-western doesn’t start up before midnight, the Provvidenza will be able to round the Cape.’

From the top of the belltower came the slow, sonorous tolling of the bell. ‘One hour after sunset,’ said padron Cipolla.

Padron ’Ntoni crossed himself and said:

‘Peace to the living and rest to the dead.’

‘Don Giammaria is having fried vermicelli for supper to-night,’ observed Piedipapera sniffing in the direction of the windows of the priest’s house. Don Giammaria, passing by on his way home, even condescended to greet him, because as things were going you had to humour those doubtful characters; and compare Tino, whose mouth was still watering, shouted after him:

‘Eh! fried vermicelli to-night, don Giammaria!’

‘Did you hear him? Right down to what I eat!’ grumbled don Giammaria between his teeth. ‘They even keep a tally on the number of mouthfuls eaten by God’s servants! all out of hatred for the church!’ and coming face to face with don Michele, the customs man, who went around with his pistol on his stomach and his trousers tucked into his boots, looking for smugglers: ‘But they don’t begrudge that lot their mouthfuls, oh dear no!’

‘I like that lot,’ said Dumb bell. ‘I like them mounting guard over decent folks’ possessions.’

‘The tiniest prompting, and he’d join the gang too,’ don Giammaria said to himself, knocking at his door. ‘Gang of thieves,’ and he carried on grumbling, with the knocker in his hand, listening warily to the footsteps of the sergeant as they died away in the darkness, in the direction of the wine shop, and brooding on what might take him towards the wine shop when he was mounting guard over decent folks’ interests!

But compare Tino knew why don Michele was going to guard decent folks’ interests over near the wine shop, because he had lost several nights’ sleep lying in wait behind the nearby elm to find out precisely that. ‘He goes there for a private chat with zio Santoro, Santuzza’s father,’ was his comment. ‘Those government idlers have to play the spy, and know everybody’s business, in Trezza and everywhere else, and zio Santoro, blind as he is, like a bat in the sunlight on the door of the wine shop, knows everything that goes on in the village, and could call us by name just from hearing our footsteps.