‘Money is made to be spent,’ said the owner of the horse, a man much given to boasting; ‘I myself, for instance, I have always spent freely and enjoyed myself, without hurting anyone. Once at our festival, having nothing else to do, I stopped a man who sold silk reels and happened to be passing with a load of his goods; I bought the whole lot, then I set them rolling about on the piazza and ran after them, kicking them here and there and everywhere! In one instant the whole crowd was after me, laughing and yelling, and the boys and young men, and even some of the older men began to imitate me. That was a game that’s not forgotten yet! Every time the old priest saw me he used to shout from ever so far: ‘Hallo, Pasquale Masia, haven’t you any reels to set rolling to-day?’

All the guests laughed at the tale, only Paul seemed absent-minded and looked pale and tired. The old man with the white beard, who was observing him with reverent affection, winked at his companions to suggest an immediate departure. It was time to leave the servant of God to his holy solitude and well-merited repose.

The guests rose from their seats all together and took respectful leave of their host; and Paul found himself alone, between the flickering flame of the oil lamp and the calm splendour of the moon that shone in through the high window, while the sound of the heavy iron-shod shoes of his departing guests echoed down the deserted street.

It was yet early to go to bed, and although he was utterly worn out and his shoulders ached with fatigue, as though he had been bearing a heavy yoke all the day, he had no thought of going up to his own room. His mother was still in the kitchen: he could not see her from where he sat, but he knew that she was watching as on the previous night.

The previous night! He felt as if he had been suddenly awakened out of a long sleep, and the distress of his return home from the house of Agnes, and his thoughts in the night, the letter, the Mass, the journey up the mountain, the villagers’ demonstration, had all been only a dream. His real life was beginning again now: he had but to take a step, a dozen steps, to open the door … and go back to her.… His real life was beginning again.

‘But perhaps she is not expecting me any longer. Perhaps she will never expect me again!’

Then he felt his knees trembling and terror took hold of him again, not at the thought of going back to her, but at the thought that she might have accepted her fate and be already beginning to forget him.

Then he realized that in the depths of his heart the hardest thing to bear since he came down from the mountain had been this – not knowing anything about her, her silence, her vanishing out of his life.