Part 53 (1/2)
”You accuse her of lying--how and when does she lie? I have held her, ever since I first knew her, for the personification of truth.”
”Well,” said Egidio uneasily, his arraignment of Ragna seemed hard to substantiate, somehow, before this stern judge, ”she says she has no housekeeping money when I know she must have. She saves and pinches, to send my money to her pauper family; she gives away the presents I have made her.”
”If she chooses to stint herself in order to help her family, and in such a way that the household does not suffer by it, I do not see what you have to complain of. Is it not natural for her to wish to help her own kith and kin? Would not you do the same? And why do you oblige her to ask you for every _centesimo_? Why do you insist on even buying her clothes for her instead of letting her do it herself? If you tyrannize over her you must expect that she will develop a slave's vices--but I can still see no evidence of a direct lie on her part; at most, she may be guilty of an occasional, and considering your conduct, most excusable equivocation! Now, my friend, you have come to a turning-point, you must realize that yourself. By your own fault, I don't say consciously--but still by your own actions, you have come to this pa.s.s, that the relations between you and your wife, are, by your own admission, impossible--and that you are both of you miserable, and but for outside intervention you would be standing here now a murderer, as a result of your ungovernable temper--the murderer of the children you really love better than anything else in the world. Pull up man! For G.o.d's sake, pull up and start out afres.h.!.+ I know Ragna will meet you half-way. Can't you see where you are going, at this rate?”
Valentini fairly squirmed under his friend's kindly hand. The indictment was terribly severe; it was the first time in his life that anyone had dared speak to him so openly and so authoritatively. It found him unprepared, bereft of his usual armour of carefully arranged appearances. The incident of the children had shaken him more than he cared to admit. If he had but little affection for Mimmo, Beppino was the very apple of his eye; but he would not willingly have done physical harm even to Mimmo. He, in common with many so-called ”bad” men, had an instinctive love of children and animals and in spite of his violent temper nearly always won their affection. He was shocked to think to what his violence had led him--so much so that he could hardly believe it. Indeed had there been no witnesses he would have denied his action and in a short time would positively have persuaded himself that no such thing had taken place. He was not a man, however, to acknowledge himself in the wrong and Ferrati knew him well enough, not to expect it of him; it was enough that he should answer, as he presently did:
”My life, certainly, is anything but happy. A man generally looks forward to finding at least peace in his own home, but that has not been my lot--although if ever a man slaved from morning to night and gave up everything for his family, I am that man!”
It was quite true that he worked hard, but he would have worked equally hard with no family to provide for, industry was in the nature of the man.
”However, ungrateful though they be, _I_ shall keep on. I was a fool to get married, I see that now, if it had not been for that attack of typhoid--but I shall keep on sacrificing myself, I can't help it, I am never happy unless I am doing something for others. What do I care for money for myself?”
He threw out his arms in a n.o.ble gesture, at which Ferrati could not help smiling.
”I must think of the future of the children! By the way,” he added almost shamefacedly, taking Ferrati's arm, ”let us go to them and see that they have taken no harm--you see I don't bear malice--”
”Let us finish all that there is to say first,” said Ferrati, anxious to wring some concession for Ragna from this unusually promising occasion.
”We were talking of your wife.”
”Oh, well, yes, Ragna. She was most insolent to me last night, mad with jealousy and perfectly insufferable--you don't know what it is, Rico, to have a jealous wife! just think, she imagined some perfectly ridiculous thing between me and that slattern, Carolina. It seems impossible to have so little _criterio_. You wouldn't believe, Rico, the things she said! She almost got the better of my patience!” Ferrati smiled grimly.
”We had more words this morning and in a fit of rage she said she would leave me, and I told her to go--_a quel paese_. _Peggio per lei!_”
His voice rose as he found a vent for his repressed feelings, he almost forgot Ferrati's presence in the joy of s.h.i.+fting to other shoulders the blame which in his heart he knew to be his. He paused, drawn to his full height, his eyes burning.
”It is always the same story 'put a beggar on horseback and he'll ride to the Devil!' I married her out of the gutter--”
”I beg your pardon, Egidio,” broke in Ferrati's stern voice, ”you did no such thing and if you set any value on my friends.h.i.+p, you will never repeat those words.”
Valentini cast a furtive side glance at him.
”Oh, well, have it as you will. I married her _colla camicia_--it amounts to the same--she has nothing of her own, so the worse for her if she goes off, as she will soon find out. Then she will beg to be taken back and I won't, I swear I won't.”
”What!” cried Ferrati horrified, ”do you mean to say you have actually driven away your wife, the mother of your child?”
”If she went it was of her own accord.”
”Then she has gone?”
Had he come too late? Had Ragna actually found courage to throw off her bondage?
”When I came in, a.s.sunta told me that the padrona had Nando call her a carriage just after luncheon, and she has not come back yet.”
Suddenly he flung himself on a chair by the table, his fingers clutching his hair, prey to a violent fit of self-pity.
”Oh, Rico, I am the unhappiest man on the earth! My wife, the woman for whom I sacrificed my whole life, has deserted me! The base ingrat.i.tude, the heartlessness of it! Think of a woman deserting her husband and children! My head will burst with the strain of it all. Oh, why was I such a fool as to marry? And a woman like that! All my life is sorrow and disappointment and _gratta-capi_.”
He was thoroughly unstrung. He had never thought that Ragna would take him at his word when he bade her begone, but by now he had thoroughly convinced himself that she was gone, and his little world rocked on its foundations. Most of all, he was sorry for himself, he felt ill-used and sore.