‘He’s better dead,’ the fisherman said philosophically. ‘Life is full of misery. It is better to die innocent and to go up into paradise, beyond the clouds, beyond all human misery. Drink, Costantino,’ he went on. ‘This wine isn’t much good, but it’s not quite vinegar yet. I remember last year, on the Feast of the Assumption, Giacobbe Dejas invited me to have supper with him. He was afraid of me. He thought I knew about him, and he wanted me to marry his sister. If you could have seen that woman you wouldn’t laugh. She went with me and the priest to Nuoro to see the judge. God helped me in the hour of death, for I have never seen a braver woman. Afterwards she became bent and shrivelled, like those fruits that wither on the plant before they ripen. I often go to visit her. To cheer her up, I say “Well, are we going to get married, my barley grain?” We both smile, though really we want to weep. Giacobbe seemed happy and content. He was getting rich, he was thinking of marrying. Then all at once, boom. He dropped like a rotten pear. That’s life. Bachisia Era bartered her daughter, thinking she’d change her own life, and now she’s the one who’s going to die of starvation first. Giovanna Era did what she did, thinking she’d find heaven on earth, and instead she finds herself like a frog skewered on a stick.’

‘Does he beat her?’ asked Costantino, upset.

‘He doesn’t beat her, but there are worse things than beatings. They’ve made her into a servant, a slave, really. You know how people in the old days treated their slaves? That’s how she’s treated in that house.’

‘God rot them.’ Costantino raised his glass. ‘Let’s drink to their damnation.’

To hear that Giovanna was unhappy gave him a feeling of cruel joy, of exquisite delight.

After their meal, the two men went outside and lay down in the shade of a wild fig tree. It was a hot afternoon. The still air smelled of poppies, the horizon shimmered in an ashy vapour, and the bees buzzed. Tired, defeated, Costantino fell asleep at once, but the fisherman could not close his eyes. A grasshopper leapt over the grass and on to the poppies. Isidoro stretched out an arm to catch it.

I know why he wants to go away, he thought. He still loves her, poor boy. If he stays here he’ll suffer like St Lawrence on the gridiron. Look at him, poor fellow. He looks like a sick child. What have they done to him? They’ve torn him apart like they’d tear a grasshopper.