Page:Lippincotts Monthly Magazine-34.djvu/145
the Sign' Clemente might think this an earthquake. He deserved a fright on many accounts. Had he not said, when he knew that the municipality had bought the place, that he hoped an earthquake might bury them under it? And had not she, a pious woman, and a child of Mary, sympathized with him so deeply that she had added, it would serve them right? And had she not abused the municipality to all her cronies, and declared that a judgment of God would fall upon them for taking the house of the oldest family in town, which ought to be as sacred as church property? And when the sacristan of Santa Lucia had said that though certainly no one had a right to buy an ancestral palace and turn the family out, yet it could not be called sacrilege, as when church property was taken, had she not flown at him and declared that it was only the difference between murder and manslaughter, and altogether berated him so that he had been very cold toward her ever since? And now the Sign' Clemente left his letter unopened till he had drunk his coffee, and then sent her for hot water! Oh, she would give him hot water!
She took the cocorna, or boiler, from the hot ashes where it stood, and pushed it into the midst of the blazing branches, turning the iron handle toward the flame.
At this instant he was reading that letter, or he had read it, and knew all that was to be known. Why had she not steamed it open and read it first herself? Nothing was easier; and she knew how to read. This was what she gained by giving him and the Signora Paula the first reading of their letters! And he could tell her to put pennyroyal blossoms instead of leaves into the artichokes "alla Judea" while her heart was in her mouth! She had half a mind to put in the bitterest leaves she could find, and a bit of a red pepper besides, and make them not only "alla Judea" but "alla Gehenna." The Sign' Clemente was as soft-mouthed as a baby. He couldn't bear peppery dishes, but would have liked to be fed on sweets and rices. And she,—she wasn't even permitted to know what was in that letter!
She caught the kitchen door once more in her nervous hands, and gave it a bang that made it shut and bound open again. He would know what that meant well enough. Then, with a coarse towel, she drew the cocorna from the fire, and carried it to his door, giving three raps that took the skin off her knuckles. "Hot water!" she growled, and tramped heavily away to hide herself behind a door and watch the result.
A few minutes passed, then the bedroom door opened a few inches, an arm in a shirt-sleeve was put outside, and the hand grasped the handle of the cocorna. There was a cry, a splash, and the cocorna fell, and the hot water went steaming over the brick floor.
Martina stole softly away, softly shut the kitchen door, and went down into the garden for her pennyroyal blossoms, determined not to hear any bell whatever, though it should be rung near enough to tangle itself in her hair. She felt better, and went about complacently pinching and pulling out the pale little violet-colored blossoms into a white saucer, wondering that no bell tried in vain to make itself heard by her. Had the cocorna-handle cooled down below the blistering-point in those few minutes of waiting? or had the Sign' Clemente fainted with pain ? He was as delicate as a lady.
The handle had cooled so much below the blistering-point, and, moreover, had been released so quickly, that it left only a momentary pain. The only impression, in fact, made by the hot water was a mental one.
When the Signer Clemente, peeping through the shutters, had seen that Martina had a letter in her hand,—poor Martina had held it conspicuously in her hand in coming down the street, with a secret thought that he might peep,—his first impulse had been to ring at once when she should enter. But as he returned to bed, and lay listening breathlessly for the sound of her key in the lock, another thought pre-