"Listen," he said; "my heart is like a vessel full of deadly poison; a single drop more and it will overflow. Let them look out who have brought all this on themselves." Then he got up and went out into the night. For hours he wandered aimlessly about, like one who had lost his way, in the wind-swept solitude. Then, about midnight, he found himself, almost without knowing how he got there, as on that first evening, beneath Giovanna's window. He climbed on the shed and tapped. Aunt Martina, lying wakeful and alert, heard everything; heard Costantino approach, heard his knock, heard Giovanna open to him; and then she knew it was hopeless. Without doubt Isidoro had faithfully reported his conversation with her, and this was Costantino's reply: he had come directly and defiantly to Giovanna. "No doubt," thought the old woman bitterly, "he argues that since old Martina lacks the courage to make her son unhappy by telling him the truth, he may as well profit by her weakness. Yes; no doubt that is what he thinks. But, he has forgotten to take account of what the poor old mother may be stirred up to do in order to protect her boy! Now, Costantino Ledda, it is between us two!" One night as Costantino slid down from the shed beneath Giovanna's window, he felt something cold and sharp enter his side; in the darkness he made out the figure of a man, his face covered with a black cloth. He threw himself upon him, and after a brief struggle, breathless, silent, determined, he succeeded in throwing him down and disarming him. Then he let him go without so much as attempting to identify him. What did it signify who the assassin was? Behind that black mask he knew only too well that Aunt Martina's gaunt features looked out, and that it was her hand that had directed the murderous stroke. He made his way back to Isidoro's hut, and, the fisherman being absent on one of his journeys, dressed the wound himself, hiding away like a stricken animal, and concealing what had happened from every one. He did not even undress, but for three days and nights lay stretched on his pallet, a prey to the bitterest reflections. The weather had become cold; outside, the wind whistled among the dry hedges, and, forcing its way into the hut, made the long threads of cobweb swing back and forth, and brought down clouds of dust from the roof. Through the window Costantino could see processions of pale blue clouds scudding across the cold, bright background of the sky; and he said to himself that he wanted to die. Death, death, what else remained for him? The world--his world--was now only a cold and empty void.