He, too, felt happy, and began to fear because of that.

How could he hide his feelings of overwhelming joy? How could he say that he was unhappy?

And when he looked at his little Dreetta, who was already pregnant, his eyes glazed over with tears, tears of tenderness and gratitude.

During the past few months his wife, along with her brother and mother, busied herself in setting up the little house. At that time Fabio Feroni's trepidation became more painful than ever. He broke out in a cold sweat whenever he heard expressions of jubilation from his wife, who was satisfied with the purchase of this or that piece of furniture.

"Come and see... come and see... " Dreetta would say to him.

He would have liked to shut her mouth with both his hands. His joy was excessive; no, it was rather happiness, true happiness that he had attained. It was not possible that some misfortune would not strike from one moment to the next. And Fabio Feroni began to look around, ahead and behind, with quick side-glances, in order to discover and avert chance's trap, the trap that could be lurking even in a tiny speck of dust. And he would throw himself on the ground and crouch on all fours, blocking his wife's passage when he would spot some fruit peel on the floor that might cause her delicate foot to slip. Yes, it was very possible that the trap was there, in that peel! Or perhaps... why yes, in that canary cage over there... Already once Dreetta had climbed onto a stool, risking a fall in order to replace the hemp in the small vase. Get rid of that canary! And hearing Dreetta protest and cry, he, all bristled and hispid like a beaten cat, began to shout:

"For heaven's sake, I beg you, let me have my way! Let me have my way!"

And his eyes, wide open, moved continuously from side to side with a mobility and shine that incited fear.

Finally one night she found him dressed only in his nightshirt, a candle in his hand, going about looking for chance's trap in the small inverted coffee cups lined up on the cupboard shelf in the dining room.

"Fabio, what are you doing?"

And he replied, placing his finger over his mouth:

"Shhh... quiet! I'll find it! I swear this time I'll find it... It won't do me in!"

All of a sudden, whether it was because of a mouse, or a small current of air, or a cockroach on his bare feet, the fact is that Fabio Feroni let out a cry, jumped up, and bucked, and then took hold of his belly with both hands, shouting that the grasshopper was there; it was there, there inside his stomach! He began dashing about, dashing about throughout the house, dressed only in his nightshirt. Then he ran down the stairs and outside through the deserted street into the night, screaming and laughing, while a disheveled Dreetta shouted for help from the window.

In the Whirlpool

At the Racquet Club they talked about nothing else the entire evening. The first to break the news was Respi, Nicolino Respi, who was profoundly saddened by it. As usual, however, he could not prevent the strong emotion from curling his lips into that nervous little smile which, even in the most serious discussions, as well as in the most difficult moments of play, rendered that small, pale, jaundiced face with its sharp features so characteristically his.

His friends, anxious and dismayed, gathered around him.

"Has he really gone mad?"

"No, only as a joke."

Traldi, buried in the sofa with all the weight of his huge pachyderm body, made several attempts, using his hands for leverage, to lift himself up and sit a bit straighter, and in the effort opened wide his bovine, bloodshot eyes, that popped out of their sockets. He asked:

"Pardon me, but are you saying that... (ooh, ooh...) are you saying that because he gave you that look, too?"

"Me, too? That look? What do you mean?" asked a stunned Nicolino Respfi, turning to his friends. "I arrived just this morning from Milan, and found this fine bit of news waiting for me here. I don't know anything about it, and I still can't understand how it is that Romeo Daddi, my God!—the most relaxed, carefree, and sensible one of us all..."

"Did they lock him up?"

"Why, yes, of course! That's what I've been trying to tell you! Today at three o'clock. In the asylum at Monte Mario."

"Oh, poor Daddi!"

"And Donna Bicetta? Is it possible... Could it have been Donna Bicetta, who...?

"No! Not her! On the contrary, she was completely against the idea! Her father hurried down from Florence the day before yesterday."

"Oh, so that's why..."

"Exactly. And he forced her to come to that decision for Daddi's sake as well... But tell me how it all happened! Now Traldi, why did you ask me whether Daddi gave me that look too?"

Carlo Traldi had again sunk blissfully into the sofa, his head thrown back, and his purple, sweaty double chin exposed to full view. Wriggling his small, thin frog's legs that his exorbitant potbelly forced him to keep obscenely apart and continually and no less obscenely moistening his lips, he absentmindedly replied:

"Oh yes, so I did. Because I thought you said he went mad on account of that."

"What do you mean, on account of that?"

"Why, of course! His madness manifested itself in him in that manner. He looked at everybody in a particular way, my dear friend. Come on, fellows; don't let me do all the talking.