Corleone: A Tale of Sicily

ona Saracinesca to her husband, on the morning after t

, free, for an instant, to let the features relax, the eye darken, or the lips smile, as the case may be-off the stage, indeed, as a comedian in the side scenes. Or again, when there is no anxiety, one goes from one's work, to take a look at the outside world, not caring to see it, but glad to be away from the task and to give the mind a breathing space. And then, also, the expression of the features changes, and if one stops to think of it, one is aware that the face is momentarily rested. Another, who has forgotten trouble and pain for a while, in conversation or in pleasant reading, goes to the window. An

from the single being loved, with no screen of secret to cast a shadow on either side. Such a life can have but few emotions, yet the possibility of the very d

he books on the table, pulled the long lace curtains a little out from under the heavy ones, turned a chair here and a knickknack there, set the little calendar on the writing-table, and mo

there are in the wo

they are not all like

hy

themselves up, and there would be universal peace, the millennium, and a general ce

came to dinner last n

uppose. Yes-I k

Corona, th

together, having long been unaccustomed to t

'They must live their own lives, as we live ours.

t happens. He has no enthusiasm like Ippolito. Nothing interests him, nothing amuses him. He is not happy, and he is not unhappy. You could not surprise him. I sometimes think that

In her heart, no thoroughly feminine woman can understand that a young

when you and I met,

fferent. Orsino is n

polito

u think, Giovanni, though he is so g

rament, my dear,-ve

ious tenacity u

ovanni. 'Or, rather, he has never thwarted

ter than the other three together. Of cou

ery just. But you ar

hing in him which no one sees. It

th a certain

race a little. He himself and his other three sons had the strongly masculine tempera

-hearted. The artistic temperament has a certain feminine quality on the surface, b

clever,' laug

known all our lives. He is an instance. You us

he h

ana; and he thinks like a man, an

ily. It seems odd that our son should have such tendencies.

stupid, at

the world, she would not have had him

not think of him as an artist. Y

e piano. Ippolito does not know a plough from a harrow, nor a thoroughbred colt from a cart-horse. For my part I do not see the strength you find in him, though I dare

position which can show his real characte

nd Corona sat down at her table to write a note. The rain pattered against the wi

' said Corona, after writing a l

ve with her,' observed her husb

e energy than she had yet shown. 'It is bad blood, Giovanni-as bad as any blood

f them. And rather

faces! They are nephews of poor Bia

children. And they are their

did

ca who received all sorts of offices and honours from Joaquin Murat and then advised King Ferdinand to have him shot when he was caught

m, but I have never met any of them excepting B

never blamed her much, poor child-and Pietro Ghisle

e to dinner, after all?' en

e shall probably know why in two or three yea

s his reason

and one of the deepest. Yet we are all sure that he is absolutely honest and honourable. We kn

t I am sorry that his plans should have involved bringing the Corleon

of those brothers was like an old

lance! Fortunately, the tim

everything i

ngs are possible to-day in Sicily which have not been possible anywhere else in Europe for at least two centuries, and the fe