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at daybreak and would sleep in the stable so as not to disturb the two women. Then he withdrew to his room. He sat for a short while at the window, smoking his pipe, and when his eyelids began to droop, he went to bed. But, as if cursed, once horizontal he no longer felt sleepy. For hours he tossed and turned, with the sheets twisting around his sweaty body. He finally became convinced that the only thing to do was to return to the window and watch the morning star. He heard Pirrotta in the stable, saddling the mule and then leaving. He waited until the dawn light allowed him to see the line of the sea in the distance, and then he lay back down, eyes wide open, hands crossed behind his head. Such was his position when Trisina came in, lay down beside him, and began kissing him through the hairs in his armpit.
    “We have all the time we want,” she said. “I drugged the old woman.”
    “You did what?”
    “I put a little poppy extract in her soup.”
    “Won’t that hurt her?”
    “No, your excellency. I tried it once when you weren’t here. It only makes her sleep late in the morning. And she’ll complain she has a little headache.”
    She began groping him and started laughing.
    “Excellency! Are you drugged, too? Let me wake it up for you, the way my lord likes best.”
    She pulled away the sheet and started sliding down the marchese’s body, but he grabbed her by the hair to stop her.
    “Let it be,” he said. “It’s feeling a little melancholy this morning.”

    Donna Matilde made her decision around the middle of January. She had just been brought lunch, which was set down on a little table in front of her armchair, when ’Ntontò heard a tremendous crash in her mother’s room. Going in, she found the little table overturned and the broth and soft-boiled egg dripping from the broken plates and onto the rug.
    “Did it fall?”
    “Nnh-unh.”
    “What happened, then?”
    “I did it. On purpose.”
    “Why?”
    “I got fed up.”
    “With the food?”
    “Nnh-unh.”
    “With sitting down?”
    “Nnh-unh.”
    “With what, then?”
    “With everything.”
    And from that day forward, there was no way to get her to swallow anything. She took to her bed, sustaining herself only with a little water in a glass on the bedside table, and she no longer wanted to talk to anyone, not even ’Ntontò. Dr. Smecca, when he came to see her, threw up his hands.
    “I’d been expecting this sooner or later. It’s not that she’s sick; she simply no longer wants to go on living.”
    ’Ntontò, however, wanted to give it one more try and sent for Fofò La Matina. Polite and solicitous as ever, the pharmacist examined the marchesa, corroborated what Smecca had said, and returned to the pharmacy. He reappeared an hour later.
    “We’re going to do an experiment,” said Fofò, pouring the contents of a small envelope into Donna Matilde’s glass. “This should stimulate her appetite.”
    But Donna Matilde’s appetite did not return, and try as the pharmacist might with a variety of differently colored powders, the result was always the same. In fact, when Donna Matilde finally noticed changes in the taste of the water, she decided not to drink anymore, but only to wet her lips with a handkerchief. At this point, Fofò La Matina, too, had to throw up his hands in front of ’Ntontò, who had no tears left to cry.

    Don Filippo sat in front of his fireplace, glorying in his creation as if he had built the royal palace of Caserta, and warming himself up with Trisina on his lap. It was early evening. Maddalena had already gone to bed, duly drugged, so there was no danger of surprises. The surprise came instead when the marchese heard someone calling him from the yard. Armed with a rifle, he cautiously opened the window and shutters.
    “It’s me, sir. Mimì.”
    “What is it?”
    “You must come into town. I brought the caleche. The signora marchesa is dying.”
    They left, with Mimì blindly lashing the horse all the