‘He’ll kick the bucket,’ said the King of Spades. ‘Why worry about a bird? You’re like a child, Costantino. You have no idea of the importance of the Delegate’s work. I, indirectly, played a major part in his discovery. It was I who put him in touch with Gooseneck. We have already managed to get out a synopsis of the work, and we have written to the king’s prime minister. But, remember! Not a word of this to anyone. One eminent scientist, who has read the synopsis, said: “It is one of the loftiest examples yet of Italian genius!” Believe me, Costantino, my dear fellow, the Delegate has climbed to dizzy heights. He has powerful friends who are now in Rome, working to obtain a pardon for him, but he has powerful enemies as well. However, this work will win him freedom.’ Costantino found this talk tiresome, but he pretended to listen with interest so as to remain in the other’s good graces, for he was waiting for a reply to a letter he had written to Giovanna.

The reply came in May, filling Costantino with joy. Giovanna wrote that the baby had been ill, perhaps because her anxieties had dried up her milk, but now he was well. Isidoro Pane had received the hymns to Saint Costantino, written in blood, and had wept when he read them. He was going to sing them in church, accompanied by the whole congregation. No one knew where the verses came from, but Isidoro said he had received them from an old man with a long white beard, dressed in white, who had appeared to him one day on the river bank. He believed it was San Costantino or even Jesus Christ himself. Giacobbe Dejas had hired himself out to his rich relatives, and the lawyer from Nuoro had taken possession of the title to their house, allowing the women to live in it for a low rent. The Dejas family often gave work to Bachisia – and also to her, Giovanna – and thus they managed to get along. Pietro Pania had been ill with a carbuncle and had died. Annicca, who was known as Silver Shoulders, had got married. An old shepherd had been arrested for stealing beehives.

Almost all Giovanna’s letters were full of such small titbits, which filled Costantino with satisfaction, pleasure, and interest. He felt as if he were breathing the air of his native land, seeing again the stones, the wild scrub, the people, the things to which his heart was most deeply attached.