DONNA CATERINA AND DONNA CONCETTA

The two sisters, Donnas Caterina and Concetta, were sitting opposite each other at the dinner-table. They were eating silently, with their eyes down; and occasionally they bent down to wipe their lips on a corner of the tablecloth that was all marked with bluish wine. A large deep-rimmed dish stood on the table between the two, full of macaroni cooked in oil, salted anchovies, and garlic, all fried lightly in an earthen pan and thrown over the boiling pasta; the two women plunged their forks now and then into the shiny oily macaroni, put some in their plates, and began to eat again. There was a big loaf of white underbaked bread, too—the tortano: they broke off bits with their hands to eat the macaroni with. A greeny-blue glass bottle full of reddish wine, that made bluish reflections, stood on the tablecloth; big glasses, and a salt-cellar, also of glass—nothing else. The sisters used leaden forks, and coarse knives with black handles; they sometimes broke off a bit of bread and dipped it in the fried oil at the bottom of the dish. Caterina, who was the roughest and saw fewest people—she lived furtively almost—put her bread into the macaroni dressing with her fingers; Concetta, who was more refined, from always going about and seeing people, put the bread neatly on her fork to dip it in the garlic, and nibbled at it after examining it. At one point, indeed, Concetta, finding a burnt bit of garlic, put it aside with a frown. Otherwise the sisters were exactly alike in gestures, way of speaking, and style of dress, though not so much so in features. Both had their hair dressed by the same woman at two sous each: it was drawn up to the top of the head, the coil fastened by big sham tortoise-shell pins, and the fringe slightly powdered over the forehead. Both wore the dress of well-to-do Naples common folk—a petticoat with no jacket, merely a trimmed bodice, that keeps the Spanish name baschina; and they never went without a thick gold chain round the neck—it was the sign of their great power—and they wore high felt boots, with noisy wooden heels. It being dinner-hour, they had left their usual work—a great coverlet of calico, pink one side and green the other, stuffed with cotton-wool—stretched over a big loom, where they stitched at it in wheels, stars, and lozenges, working quickly, one on each side of it, their heads down and noses on the pattern, pulling the needle out and in monotonously. The loom was pushed into a corner; the displaced chairs were noticeable. Now a little servant of fourteen came in, red-haired, white-faced, and marked with freckles, carrying the second course—a bit of Basilicata cheese, like a dry cream cheese, called provola, and two big sticks of celery. She glanced at Donna Caterina to know what to do with the macaroni left in the dish.

'Keep two bits for Menichella,' said the holder of the small game, as she cut a big slice of cheese.

'Yes, ma'am,' the girl said as she went out.

Menichella was a poor old thing of sixty; her son, in the Municipal Guard, had been killed in a fight with Camorrists in Pignasecca Square by a revolver-shot in the stomach. She lived on alms, and every Friday arrived at the Esposito sisters' house, where she got a hot dish, half a loaf of bread, and some scraps. The Espositos did this out of devotion to our lovely Lady of Sorrows, whose day is Friday. On Wednesday they gave the same alms to a blind beggar called Guarattelle, because for many years he kept a puppet-show; this charity they dedicated to the Virgin of the Carmine, Wednesday being her day. On Monday, too, they fed a deserted boy of ten, that the whole Rosariello di Porta Medina Road were taken up about and fed, while the Esposito sisters helped him that one day for the sake of souls in Purgatory, their day being Monday. A beggar seldom knocked at their door any day without getting something. 'Do it for St. Joseph; his day has come round.' 'The Holy Trinity be praised! to-day is Sunday; give alms.' Something to eat, a glass of wine, some scraps, beggars always carried off—money never. The sisters had too great a respect for sous to give them away. It was better charity, they explained, to give food, than encourage vice by giving money.

The beggars stayed on the landing; the sisters never let them in, fearing always for the valuables in the house; they used to carry out the dish of macaroni, vegetables, or salad. Sometimes the beggar ate it on the stairs, muttering blessings. They had now eaten the smoked cheese and bread, slowly, moving their jaws rather voluptuously, tearing the celery off in strips, and munching it noisily, like fruit, to take the taste of oil out of their mouths. When they were done, they kept still for a little, gazing at the blue stains on the tablecloth, with their hands in their laps, silently digesting and making long mental calculations, as women of business. The servant-girl, Peppina, carried off everything in a trice; the clatter of her old shoes was heard in the kitchen next door, as she went backwards and forwards to wash a few plates, stopping now and then to turn her macaroni in the pan; she had set it to fry again, seeing it was cold.

Now the sisters got up, shook the crumbs out of their laps, and went to take their place at the loom again, bending over it, the right hand, covered with rings, rising methodically, the left held under the loom, to stitch through. There was a ring at the bell; the sisters glanced at each other, and quickly took up their work. Besides what they earned from it, it served as a screen, morally and physically.

Two girls, dressmakers, came in, pushing each other forward. The first, the bolder, was Antonietta, who worked with a dressmaker in Santa Chiara Street, the same that went to buy lunch for Nannina and herself at the wine-seller's opposite the lottery office. Both of them were, wretchedly dressed, in poor woollen skirts, a gaudy but shabby jacket of another colour, and a little black shawl, which they liked to let slip down on their arms, to show their bust; a bunch of red ribbon was tied at the neck. Nannina, the smallest, was a relation of the Espositos; she had a holy terror of her aunts, with their money and jewels, for they always received her with pensive and intentional coldness. Still, they let her kiss their hands.

The two girls were still standing near the loom, looking on at this alert industry as if they were put out.

'Have you not gone to work to-day?' Donna Caterina asked Nannina.

'I have been at it,' the girl at once volubly answered, being prodded by Antonietta's elbow. 'But our mistress sent us to buy some things near here, and, as this friend of mine wants to ask a favour from you, we came....'

'Who do you want this favour from?' said Donna Concetta, raising her head from her work.

'From you, aunt,' stammered the niece.

'You don't say so!' her aunt exclaimed, in an ironical tone, smiling and shaking her head.

The girls said nothing; they looked at each other: from the start the thing was going badly.

Caterina, as she took no interest in the subject now, cut the tacking with a pair of scissors, where it had been already stitched, which covered her maroon bodice with white threads.

'Have you lost your tongues? What is it about?' Donna Concetta asked, laughing.

'Well, now I will tell you, ma'am,' the blonde began, biting her lips to make them red. 'I would like a new dress for Easter, a pair of boots, and cotton to make three or four chemises. If I was frugal, and made them myself, after my day's work is done, forty francs would do. I have not got it; it would take a year to save it. Knowing you are good and kind to poor folk, I had an idea you might lend me these forty francs.'

'It was not a good idea of yours,' said the money-lender freezingly.

'Why? I can pay off the debt at so much a week. I earn twenty-five sous a day; I don't owe a penny to anyone. Ask Nannina; she is my guarantee.'

'Nannina ought to find a security for herself,' Donna Concetta grumbled. 'But why do you need this dress? Is what you have on not enough? If one has no money, get no dresses. When my sister and I had no means, we got no clothes. You are all mad, you girls, nowadays!'

'Aunt, aunt, do her this favour; she has a lover, and she is ashamed to go ill-dressed,' the niece begged for her friend.

'I have had a lover too,' Donna Concetta answered; 'he was not ashamed when I was ill-dressed.'

'Men nowadays are quite different,' Antonietta murmured. 'So do me this favour.'

'I don't know you, my dear.'

'I work for Cristina Gagliardi, at No. 18, Santa Chiara, the first-floor. I live at No. 3, Strettola di Porto; you can make inquiries.'

Silence followed, and the girls again gave each other an alarmed look.

'At most—at most,' said Donna Concetta, looking up, 'I can give you stuff to make a dress on credit, and cotton for the chemises.... I will ask a merchant that knows me—a good man; but you will pay dearer for your clothes.'

'No matter, it doesn't matter,' Antonietta quickly interrupted; 'do so.'

'What colour is the stuff to be?' Donna Concetta asked maternally.

'Navy blue or bottle green; I like navy blue best.'

'It will suit you best—navy blue; you look well in it,' said Nannina, in an important way.

'It does not discolour so easily,' Donna Concetta settled it by saying. 'How many yards do you need?'

The girl counted to herself, moved her fingers as if she was measuring, looked at her figure, and counted over again.

'Ten metres—yes, that would be enough.'

'Ten metres; Jesus! so you want to be in the fashion.'

'Donna Concetta, be forbearing,' Antonietta answered smilingly.

'Very good—very good; for each chemise four metres is needed—sixteen in all.'

'And the shoes?' the girl asked hesitatingly.

'I know no shoemaker, my dear.'

'You will give me the rest of the forty francs in money?' the sewing girl risked saying.

'Listen, my dear,' said Donna Concetta: 'I am going to-morrow, or Saturday, to the dressmaker's to ask if you really get over a franc a day, and if you have taken any money in advance. Then I'll arrange with the dressmaker that, instead of giving you your whole pay for the week, she keeps back two francs for me as interest on the forty francs.'

'Two francs?' the girl cried out, alarmed at this long story.

'Of course. I should get four, a sou a week for each franc; but you are a poor girl, and I really wish to help you. The dressmaker gives me the two francs for interest. You pay off the rest of the debt as it suits you, five or three francs at a time. Do you understand?'

'Yes, ma'am, yes,' the terrified girl cried out.

'The quicker you pay the better for you, and it will suit me. However, I warn you, if you were to get the dressmaker to pay you in advance, go away, or play any trick of the kind, I'll come to you, my dear, and let you see who Concetta Esposito is. I would think nothing of going to the galleys for my heart's blood.... Have I made it plain?'

'Yes, ma'am, yes,' Antonietta stammered, with tears in her eyes.

'There is still time for you not to do it,' Donna Concetta ended up icily, bending down again to stitch the coverlet.

'No, no!' the girl screamed out—'whatever you like. Promise me to come to-morrow to Santa Chiara Road.'

'We see each other to-morrow,' said Donna Concetta, taking leave of her.

'You will bring the things and the money?'

'I must think over it.'

'Good-bye, aunt,' Nannina murmured, pale and more frightened than her friend.

'The Virgin go with you,' answered the Espositos in a chorus, beginning to work again.

The girls went off quite silently, with their heads down, not able to speak or smile. A woman coming up, hurriedly, knocked against them; and with a quick 'Excuse me!' she went to ring at the Espositos' door. It was Carmela, the cigar-girl, with her big, sorrowful eyes and worn face. Before going into the house she sighed deeply, and her face flushed.

'May I come in?' she said from the lobby, in a weak voice.

'Come in,' was the answer from inside. 'Is it you, good soul?' said Concetta, on recognising her; 'are you really come to give me back that money? your conscience pricked you at last? Give it over here.'

'You are joking, Donna Concetta,' said the poor thing, with a pale smile. 'If I had thirty-four francs, I would give as many leaps in the air.'

'It is thirty-seven and a half francs, with last week's interest,' the money-lender coldly corrected her.

'As you like: who is denying it? As you say, it is thirty-seven and a half, I am sure you are right.'

'You have brought the interest, at least?'

'Nothing, nothing,' the girl said desperately, holding down her head. 'I am eaten up by misery: I have got to earning a franc and a half a day; now I might live like a lady, but——'

'Why do you waste your money?' asked Donna Concetta, giving in to her fad of preaching prudence to her debtors. 'You are a beast, that is what you are!'

'But why,' Carmela cried out desperately—'why should I not give a bit of bread to my old mother? When my sister is dying of hunger with her three children, and one of them wasting away piteously, can I refuse her half a franc? When my brother-in-law, Gaetano, has nothing to smoke, for all his vices, should I deny him a few sous? With what heart could I do it?'

'It is Raffaele that sucks you out—it is Raffaele!' the money-lender sang out, threading a needle with red cotton.

'What about that?' the girl cried out, throwing out her arms; 'he was born to be a gentleman. In the meanwhile, if I don't pay the landlord on Monday, he will turn me out. I owe him thirty francs: but I might at least give him ten! If you would just do me this charity!'

'You are mad, my dear.'

'Donna Concetta, what are ten francs to you? I'll give them back, you know: I have never taken a farthing from anyone. Don't have me thrown on the streets, ma'am. Do it for the sake of your dead in paradise!'

'No, no, no!' sang out the seamstress.

'Listen, look here,' the other went on sorrowfully: 'these earrings I am wearing my godmother paid seventeen francs for; I give them to you—I have nothing else. You will give me them back when I give you the ten francs.'

'I never take a pawn,' Donna Concetta replied, glancing at the earrings.

'But it is not a pawn; it is a favour you are doing me. If I were to pawn it, I would get five or six francs; they would take the interest beforehand, with the money for the ticket, the box, and the witness, and only three or four francs would be left. Do it only this once, ma'am—the Virgin from heaven preserve you!' She convulsively took out her rather worn earrings, rubbed them with a corner of her apron, and put them gently on the coverlet, still looking at them earnestly, taking leave of them. Donna Concetta took them with a scornful grimace, and glanced at her sister, who just raised her head and signed 'Yes,' with a wink. Donna Concetta got up stiffly; without saying anything, she carried the earrings into the next room, where the sisters slept; a noise of keys in locks was heard, an opening and shutting of strong boxes, with silent intervals. Then Donna Concetta came in again. She carried two rolls of yellow paper in her hand.

'They are sous: count them,' she said shortly, putting them down before Carmela.

'It does not matter-they are sure to be right,' said the poor little thing, trembling with emotion. 'The Eternal Father should give it back to you in health, the kindness you do me.'

'Very good,' Donna Concetta finished up with, sitting down again to work. 'But I warn you I'll sell the earrings if you don't pay.'

'Never fear,' Carmela murmured as she went off.

For a little the sisters were alone, stitching.

'The earrings are worth twelve francs in gold,' said Caterina. She had sharp ears.

'Yes,' said Concetta; 'but Carmela will pay; she is a good girl.'

Again they heard the bell tinkle.

'It sounds like the midwife's bell,' Caterina remarked.

A dragging noise was heard, the sound of a box put down in the corner of the stair, and Michele, the shoeblack, came in with his hip up, as if he was still carrying his block. He greeted them in the Spanish style, saying, 'La vostra buona grazia' (I am your humble servant), whilst the thousand wrinkles on his rickety boy's face, grown old, seemed to breathe out malice. The sisters looked patiently at him, waiting till he spoke.

'Gaetano Galiero, the glove-cutter, sends me——'

'Fine honest fellow he is!' exclaimed Donna Concetta, putting a strip of paper in her thimble—it had got too large.

'If you don't make people speak, you can never get to understand each other,' the hunchback rejoined philosophically. 'Gaetano is under great obligations to you; but you are a fine woman, not wanting in judgment, and you will forgive his failings. What does not happen in a year comes the day you least expect it. Gaetano is here with the money.'

'Yes, yes,' the sisters said, grinning.

'You will see him afterwards. But I have come to speak of an affair of my own. I, thank God, work at a better trade than Gaetano does; I stand beside the CafÉ de Angelis in CaritÀ Square. I don't say it out of boasting, but I polish the shoes of the best nobility in Naples. I can earn what I like; I laugh at ill fortune. When it rains, I stand under the archway of the cafÉ door; the dirtier it is in the streets, the more shoes I polish. My good woman, if I had a clear head, I would be a gentleman now. But now, to carry out a big affair that may bring me my carriage, I need a little money; and as you oblige people that way, I have come to propose the business to you. Forty francs would do for me; I would pay it off by three francs a week until I have managed the combination; for then I will give you back capital, interest, and a handsome present.'

'Don't put yourself about,' said Donna Concetta ironically.

'If you won't lend me money, who do you lend to?' the hunchback asked audaciously. 'If I stand all day in front of the cafÉ, I earn two francs, do you know. Not even a barber's lad can say as much. So that stand is my fortune, my shop; if I go away from it, I don't earn a half-penny, so I can't run away. Do you see? Ask the coffee-house-keeper who Michele is. Your money is safe in my hands. You will hear all about me from the cafÉ-owner.'

'If he guarantees you, I'll give you the money,' Donna Concetta said at once.

'In that case, he would give it himself' the hunchback objected. 'No, no, Michele has no need of a guarantee. Come to-morrow, Saturday, at nine, to the cafÉ-owner; you will hear what he says; you will willingly give me sixty instead of forty francs. I am an honest man; I am subject to public scrutiny.'

'Good; we see each other to-morrow. You know what the interest is?' said Donna Concetta.

'Whatever you like,' the hunchback gallantly answered; 'you can have a cup of coffee, too, and a roll inside: I am master at the coffee-house! Can I do anything for you?'

'We wish for your prayers always,' the two women said in a low tone, as he was going away. After working a little, Caterina observed:

'You said yes to him too soon.'

'I will make the coffee-house-keeper guarantee him. He is a hunchback, too; that brings luck,' Donna Concetta replied.

'If it brings luck, it ought to bring an end to this hard life of ours,' Caterina began again. She liked to complain of her luck.

'Oh,' the other sighed, 'we have no man to give us a helping hand, ever; so we have to do justice for ourselves always. Ciccillo and Alfonso are simpletons. It is no use....'

'What can we do?' sighed the other.

The two sisters gave up working, let their hands fall idle on the red coverlet, and began to think of their secret sorrow—the tormenting pain they confessed to no one—of their betrothed lovers, two good workmen, brothers, at the arsenal, Jannacone by name, who loved them, but would not marry them, either of the two, because of their trade. The struggle between love and money had gone on for three years, but Ciccillo and Alfonso Jannacone would not hear of marrying a gambler or a money-lender; the whole arsenal would have taunted them. They were good workmen, rather simple, very silent, who did not spend their day's wages; they had some savings, and came to spend the evening with the two sisters. Obstinate on that idea, one of the few that got into their heads, neither love nor avarice could overcome it. Several times the sisters, being keen on gain and bitterly offended at that refusal, had quarrelled with their lovers and chased them out of the house; but only for a short time: peace was made, Concetta and Caterina naturally promising to give over their business. The women must have made a lot of money, but they never spoke of it, and, in spite of their love for Alfonso and Ciccillo Jannacone, they themselves put off the marriages so as to gain still more money, not knowing how to break through that round of money-lending business. They did not wish to give up old loans, and could not resist making new ones; they did not understand why their lovers were so ashamed, and complained of it as an injustice. The sisters thought themselves humane to lend money at usury; to give lottery tickets at a sou or two seemed an act of charity to them, because the Naples poor—skinned and flayed as they were when they took money from Concetta to give it to Caterina and the Government—thanked and blessed them with tears. When they were quite alone, in expansive moments, the two complained of their fate; anyone else but the Jannacone brothers would have been happy enough to have such industrious, hard-working wives with dowries. But the workmen would not given in; they persisted they would never marry unless that way of gaining money was given up. Ciccillo especially, Caterina's betrothed, was hard as a stone; indeed, he said to her sometimes: 'Caterina, one day or other you'll go to prison.'

'I'll pay for bail and get out. Then the lawyer will get me off.'

She knew the law and its intrigues.

'If you go to prison, you don't see my face again,' Ciccillo retorted, lighting his cigar.

Yes, when they were alone the sisters despaired. But love of money was so strong, it made them put off the time for the double marriage. The two workmen waited patiently, slowly buying furniture with their savings to set up house together, as they never left each other.

'Wait till Easter,' the sisters said, thinking of ending up all their affairs by then.

'Good; at Easter,' the brothers agreed.

'We will be ready by September,' said they in April, being more than ever involved in a network of sordid business.

'In September, then,' the workmen complied.

Always when they were alone the women complained of being badly treated by Fate, and of being misunderstood by the men they loved, ending up with: 'Ciccillo and Alfonso are fools.'

But they were not long alone that day, either. The wretched trade went on till evening. There came a painter of saints, so far an artist that he painted the face, hands, and feet of all the wooden and stucco saints in Naples and its neighbourhood's thousand churches: a sickly man, who asked for money, and only got it on condition he brought a statuette of the Immaculate Conception in blue, covered with stars, next day, that Madonna being Concetta the money-lender's patron. Annarella, Carmela's sister, came in to ask for a loan, being desperate: 'just two francs for the day, just as a charity.' She wanted to make a little broth for her sick child. A horrible scene followed: the women would not believe her; she just wanted to fool them again, for Gaetano and she had a big debt, and were not ashamed to take poor folk's blood and not give it back. Annarella screamed, wept, and cried out that she would go and get her baby, all burning with fever, to show to them. A stone would pity him. Then she sobbed out that they said what was quite true; but to pity the poor little thing, who was not to blame, and now that he was weaned, she could take another half-day service, which the Virgin would help her to find. At last, as Concetta felt bored, to get rid of the crying and weeping she gave her the two francs, cursing and taking her oath they were the last, as true as it was Friday in March—perhaps the day our Lord died, as it is not known what Friday in March Jesus died on. Other people, either embarrassed, furious, or sorrowful, came to pay up old interest, to offer goods in pledge, or ask for more money. The debtors went on from humility to bitterness, from threats to beseeching, from solemn promises to mean tricks. Concetta continued working opposite her sister through the disputes, quarrels, and threats till evening came. She never got tired, and always had an effective retort ready or some lucid remark, finding out a good or bad payer at once. Only for one neatly-dressed, discreet caller, shaved like a good class of servant, she got up and went into the next room, where they chattered in a low tone for some time. The usual noise of keys creaking in the locks, and opening and shutting of strong boxes, was heard; the servant went out, still looking reserved, followed by Concetta.

'Is that the Marquis di Formosa's steward?' Caterina asked when he had gone.

'Yes, it is,' said Concetta, without adding more.

That hard, fatiguing Friday came to an end. Now it was getting dark the sisters had given up stitching the coverlet. Caterina, for Saturday, her great day, got ready some thick registers, written in shapeless characters, all ciphers, which she understood very well. She leant over it under the oil-lamp, thinking whilst her lips moved; and Concetta, seeing her deep in her important weekly work, kept silence out of respect to that sagacious preparation, feeling sure that next day money would be flowing in to them.