Saturday evening was bitter cold. A dry and icy wind had whitened the street, making it look like it was made of the bones of the dead. Every door was shut tightly. Far off in the distance, dark clouds fringed in red gathered over the sea. A random window banged back and forth, and a woman who was passing wrapped herself tightly in her shawl and said, “The sky is overcast. It’s going to storm.”

An old woman carrying a bundle of sticks lamented, “We’re going to have a bad Easter this year, to pay for our sins.”

Ciancianedda looked out at the sky from behind the grate and shivered. She was feverish.

It was early, and it already seemed like nighttime; Graziano would be coming home late because he was stopping in Petranìca to get the lamb.

Ciancianedda pulled an old scappularu out of the chest where she kept her wedding dress with the big stain that looked like blood.

She glanced at the spent fireplace and then went back to search the darkening sky.

• • •

Silvestra was humming away. The fog that was descending rapidly on the town made it impossible to distinguish one house from another.

Graziano would be late. He had to pass by massaro Peppe’s quota because the farmer wanted to give him a lamb for the deaf one.

She heard a soft knocking. She wasn’t expecting anyone at that hour, and Graziano couldn’t be back yet. Edging the door open cautiously, she glimpsed a man, small in stature, with a hood pulled over his eyes; he was leaning against the wall like a beggar or someone having trouble staying on his feet, holding the edges of the scappularu, which was too big for him, together at his chest.

“What do you want?” she asked him brusquely. There was no reply.

So she cracked the door open a bit more.

“Well, who are you looking for? What do you want?” she repeated.

A hand moved beneath the scappularu, then clutched the ends of the cape again.

Two strange, shining eyes, full of terror, were staring out at Silvestra. She quickly shut the door, shaken; she listened intently. Had he gone yet? Then she started humming again to rid herself of the disturbing image.

Ciancianedda took a few steps. Staggering, she fell to the ground in a dark and deserted corner. She let the pistol slip slowly onto her knees. She was no longer thinking about Graziano coming back, or that someone might see her.

Was there, just maybe, a place for her? She was more alone than the beggar who sleeps under the stars, more lost than the child who can’t find his own doorstep.

She loathed herself and everything about her life, and she asked God to forgive her the act she had not dared to commit.