The Call of the Blood
Page 62Sebastiano took his arm from Lucrezia's waist as Hermione came down to
the terrace, and said: "Buona sera, signora. Is the signore coming down yet?"
He flung out his arm towards the mountain.
"I don't know, Sebastiano. Why?"
"I've come with a message for him."
"Not for Lucrezia?"
Sebastiano laughed boldly, but Lucrezia, blushing red, disappeared into
the kitchen.
"Don't play with her, Sebastiano," said Hermione. "She's a good girl."
"I know that, signora."
"She deserves to be well treated."
round, and came back.
"Who's treating Lucrezia badly, signora?"
"I did not say anybody was."
"The girls in Marechiaro can take care of themselves, signora. You don't
know them as I do."
"D'you think any woman can take care of herself, Sebastiano?"
He looked into her face and laughed, but said nothing. Hermione sat down.
She had a desire to-day, after Lucrezia's conversation with her, to get
at the Sicilian man's point of view in regard to women.
"Don't you think women want to be protected?" she asked.
There was still laughter in his eyes.
"Not from us, anyway," he added. "Lucrezia there--she wants me for her
husband. All Marechiaro knows it."
Hermione felt that under the circumstances it was useless to blush for
Lucrezia, useless to meet blatant frankness with sensitive delicacy.
"Do you want Lucrezia for your wife?" she said.
"Well, signora, I'm strong. A stick or a knife in my hand and no man can
touch me. You've never seen me do the scherma con coltello? One day I'll
show you with Gaspare. And I can play better even than the men from
Bronte on the ceramella. You've heard me. Lucrezia knows I can have any
There was a simplicity in his immense superiority to women that robbed it
of offensiveness and almost made Hermione laugh. In it, too, she felt the
touch of the East. Arabs had been in Sicily and left their traces there,
not only in the buildings of Sicily, but in its people's songs, and in
the treatment of the women by the men.
"And are you going to choose Lucrezia?" she asked, gravely.
"Signora, I wasn't sure. But yesterday, I had a letter from Messina. They
want me there. I've got a job that'll pay me well to go to the Lipari
Islands with a cargo."