Part 47 (1/2)
Ninna was a blue-eyed thing, at the tottering, tumbling age--a fair solid, which, like a loaded die, found its base with a constancy that warranted prediction. Tessa went to s.n.a.t.c.h her up, and when Babbo was paying due attention to the recent teeth and other marvels, she said, in a whisper, ”And shall I buy some confetti for the children?”
t.i.to drew some small coins from his sca.r.s.ella, and poured them into her palm.
”That will buy no end,” said Tessa, delighted at this abundance. ”I shall not mind going without Lillo so much, if I bring him something.”
So Tessa set out in the morning towards the great Piazza where the bonfire was to be. She did not think the February breeze cold enough to demand further covering than her green woollen dress. A mantle would have been oppressive, for it would have hidden a new necklace and a new clasp, mounted with silver, the only ornamental presents t.i.to had ever made her. Tessa did not think at all of showing her figure, for no one had ever told her it was pretty; but she was quite sure that her necklace and clasp were of the prettiest sort ever worn by the richest contadina, and she arranged her white hood over her head so that the front of her necklace might be well displayed. These ornaments, she considered, must inspire respect for her as the wife of some one who could afford to buy them.
She tripped along very cheerily in the February suns.h.i.+ne, thinking much of the purchases for the little ones, with which she was to fill her small basket, and not thinking at all of any one who might be observing her. Yet her descent from her upper storey into the street had been watched, and she was being kept in sight as she walked by a person who had often waited in vain to see if it were not Tessa who lived in that house to which he had more than once dogged t.i.to. Balda.s.sarre was carrying a package of yarn: he was constantly employed in that way, as a means of earning his scanty bread, and keeping the sacred fire of vengeance alive; and he had come out of his way this morning, as he had often done before, that he might pa.s.s by the house to which he had followed t.i.to in the evening. His long imprisonment had so intensified his timid suspicion and his belief in some diabolic fortune favouring t.i.to, that he had not dared to pursue him, except under cover of a crowd or of the darkness; he felt, with instinctive horror, that if t.i.to's eyes fell upon him, he should again be held up to obloquy, again be dragged away his weapon would be taken from him, and he should be cast helpless into a prison-cell. His fierce purpose had become as stealthy as a serpent's, which depends for its prey on one dart of the fang.
Justice was weak and unfriended; and he could not hear again the voice that pealed the promise of vengeance in the Duomo; he had been there again and again, but that voice, too, had apparently been stifled by cunning strong-armed wickedness. For a long while, Balda.s.sarre's ruling thought was to ascertain whether t.i.to still wore the armour, for now at last his fainting hope would have been contented with a successful stab on this side the grave; but he would never risk his precious knife again. It was a weary time he had had to wait for the chance of answering this question by touching t.i.to's back in the press of the street. Since then, the knowledge that the sharp steel was useless, and that he had no hope but in some new device, had fallen with leaden weight on his enfeebled mind. A dim vision of winning one of those two wives to aid him came before him continually, and continually slid away.
The wife who had lived on the hill was no longer there. If he could find her again, he might grasp some thread of a project, and work his way to more clearness.
And this morning he had succeeded. He was quite certain now where this wife lived, and as he walked, bent a little under his burden of yarn, yet keeping the green and white figure in sight, his mind was dwelling upon her and her circ.u.mstances as feeble eyes dwell on lines and colours, trying to interpret them into consistent significance.
Tessa had to pa.s.s through various long streets without seeing any other sign of the Carnival than unusual groups of the country people in their best garments, and that disposition in everybody to chat and loiter which marks the early hours of a holiday, before the spectacle has begun. Presently, in her disappointed search for remarkable objects, her eyes fell on a man with a pedlar's basket before him, who seemed to be selling nothing but little red crosses to all the pa.s.sengers. A little red cross would be pretty to hang up over her bed; it would also help to keep off harm, and would perhaps make Ninna stronger. Tessa went to the other side of the street that she might ask the pedlar the price of the crosses, fearing that they would cost a little too much for her to spare from her purchase of sweets. The pedlar's back had been turned towards her hitherto, but when she came near him she recognised an old acquaintance of the Mercato, Bratti Ferravecchi, and, accustomed to feel that she was to avoid old acquaintances, she turned away again and pa.s.sed to the other side of the street. But Bratti's eye was too well practised in looking out at the corner after possible customers, for her movement to have escaped him, and she was presently arrested by a tap on the arm from one of the red crosses.
”Young woman,” said Bratti, as she unwillingly turned her head, ”you come from some castello a good way off, it seems to me, else you'd never think of walking about, this blessed Carnival, without a red cross in your hand. Santa Madonna! Four white quattrini is a small price to pay for your soul--prices rise in purgatory, let me tell you.”
”Oh, I should like one,” said Tessa, hastily, ”but I couldn't spare four white quattrini.”
Bratti had at first regarded Tessa too abstractedly as a mere customer to look at her with any scrutiny, but when she began to speak he exclaimed, ”By the head of San Giovanni, it must be the little Tessa, and looking as fresh as a ripe apple! What! you've done none the worse, then, for running away from father Nofri? You were in the right of it, for he goes on crutches now, and a crabbed fellow with crutches is dangerous; he can reach across the house and beat a woman as he sits.”
”I'm married,” said Tessa, rather demurely, remembering Naldo's command that she should behave with gravity; ”and my husband takes great care of me.”
”Ah, then, you've fallen on your feet! Nofri said you were good-for-nothing vermin; but what then? An a.s.s may bray a good while before he shakes the stars down. I always said you did well to run away, and it isn't often Bratti's in the wrong. Well, and so you've got a husband and plenty of money? Then you'll never think much of giving four white quattrini for a red cross. I get no profit; but what with the famine and the new religion, all other merchandise is gone down.
You live in the country where the chestnuts are plenty, eh? You've never wanted for polenta, I can see.”
”No, I've never wanted anything,” said Tessa, still on her guard.
”Then you can afford to buy a cross. I got a Padre to bless them, and you get blessing and all for four quattrini. It isn't for the profit; I hardly get a danaro by the whole lot. But then they're holy wares, and it's getting harder and harder work to see your way to Paradise: the very Carnival is like Holy Week, and the least you can do to keep the Devil from getting the upper hand is to buy a cross. G.o.d guard you!
think what the Devil's tooth is! You've seen him biting the man in San Giovanni, I should hope?”
Tessa felt much teased and frightened. ”Oh, Bratti,” she said, with a discomposed face, ”I want to buy a great many confetti: I've got little Lillo and Ninna at home. And nice coloured sweet things cost a great deal. And they will not like the cross so well, though I know it would be good to have it.”
”Come, then,” said Bratti, fond of laying up a store of merits by imagining possible extortions and then heroically renouncing them, ”since you're an old acquaintance, you shall have it for two quattrini.
It's making you a present of the cross, to say nothing of the blessing.”
Tessa was reaching out her two quattrini with trembling hesitation, when Bratti said abruptly, ”Stop a bit! Where do you live?”
”Oh, a long way off,” she answered, almost automatically, being preoccupied with her quattrini; ”beyond San Ambrogio, in the Via Piccola, at the top of the house where the wood is stacked below.”
”Very good,” said Bratti, in a patronising tone; ”then I'll let you have the cross on trust, and call for the money. So you live inside the gates? Well, well, I shall be pa.s.sing.”
”No, no!” said Tessa, frightened lest Naldo should be angry at this revival of an old acquaintance. ”I can spare the money. Take it now.”
”No,” said Bratti, resolutely; ”I'm not a hard-hearted pedlar. I'll call and see if you've got any rags, and you shall make a bargain. See, here's the cross: and there's Pippo's shop not far behind you: you can go and fill your basket, and I must go and get mine empty. _Addio, piccina_.”
Bratti went on his way, and Tessa, stimulated to change her money into confetti before further accident, went into Pippo's shop, a little fluttered by the thought that she had let Bratti know more about her than her husband would approve. There were certainly more dangers in coming to see the Carnival than in staying at home; and she would have felt this more strongly if she had known that the wicked old man, who had wanted to kill her husband on the hill, was still keeping her in sight. But she had not noticed the man with the burden on his back.
The consciousness of having a small basketful of things to make the children glad, dispersed her anxiety, and as she entered the Via de'
Libraj her face had its visual expression of childlike content. And now she thought there was really a procession coming, for she saw white robes and a banner, and her heart began to palpitate with expectation.