The night was chilly. The wind had started to blow more strongly, ripping the first dead leaves from the trees. Without knowing why, Martina felt sadder and more desolate than ever. She felt as if the cold autumn wind were piercing right through to her soul. As she passed by a cottage more wretched than the rest, she raised her head, and lowered it at once, afraid that some invisible being would discern the grim idea that had passed through her mind. The man who lived in the cottage was a poor peasant, who had once asked her to lend him money.

‘Lend!’ she had replied ironically. ’How do you expect to pay it back?’

‘If I cannot repay it,’ he had replied, ‘I will show you my gratitude in some other way. You can ask anything of me.’

She had understood. In return for money the man had put himself at her disposal, would even go to the lengths of committing a crime. She hadn’t needed anything then and she had sent the man away. Now, passing by the ruined cottage in the dark, windy evening, she remembered the peasant’s ravaged, resolute face. She saw the misery that burned in his eyes, his lips, pale with hunger, his rough, dirty hands, ready to do anything that might drag some sort of good out of fate. The hate that gripped her selfish heart put a fearful idea into her mind as, like a portent of horror, she passed by the poor man’s cottage, wrapped in her shawl, borne along by the wind.

That evening Isidoro had a long conversation with Costantino, begging him to avert the tragedy that hung over all their heads. Costantino stared at the old man and smiled his bitter, mocking smile.

‘What can happen?’ he said. ‘You yourself agree that the old hag will say nothing to her son. Is Giovanna my wife or isn’t she? If I go to her, it’s because I have the right.’

‘Oh, Son of God!’ sighed Isidoro, clasping his hands together and shaking his head. ‘You’ll destroy yourself. Watch out. Martina Dejas is capable of anything.’

Costantino’s eyes shone with hatred. ‘My heart is like a jug of poison,’ he said. ‘One more drop and it will brim over. Woe to them who have made me do evil.’

So saying, he went outside and wandered slowly through the gloomy night. He felt lost in a wilderness of wind and loneliness. Almost without wanting it, at midnight, as in the first time, he found himself standing beneath Giovanna’s window. Two roofs, one slightly higher than the other, enabled him to climb up. He knocked and Giovanna opened.