He obeyed. A little table was laid expressly for him in the kitchen. His "parents," according to custom, took their supper seated on the floor, with meat and cakes in a basket before them. Nothing was changed. The kitchen was still poor and dark, but very clean. The stove was in the centre. The walls were adorned with trenchers and hunting spears, with great baskets, sieves and other utensils for sifting flour: in a corner were two woollen sacks containing barley. Near the narrow door, which was thrown open, hung the seed pouch and the rest of the fanning outfit. A baby pig, tied to the elder tree in the courtyard, grunted gently, puffed and sighed. A red cat quietly placed himself by the little table and yawned, raising great yellow eyes to Anania. He was looking about him in a kind of stupor. No, nothing was changed; yet he felt somehow as if he were in this environment for the first time, with that tall peasant of the brilliant eyes and the long oily hair, with that pretty elderly woman, fair and fat as a dove. "At last we are alone," said Big Anania, who was eating salad made into a sandwich with girdle cakes; "but you'll see they won't leave you long in peace. It'll be Atonzu here, Atonzu there! you're an important man now you've been in Rome. I, too, when I returned from my military service----" "What sort of a comparison is that?" protested Aunt Tatàna. "Do let me speak. I remember I had the greatest difficulty in talking dialect. I felt as if I were in a new world." The student looked at his father and smiled. "That's what I feel," he said. "I daresay you do. After a while I got used to it; but as for you, after three days you'll be sick of this gossipy place and--and----" His wife frowned and he changed the subject a little. "Eh! what a big place that devil of a Rome is to be sure! Give me the glass, my old beauty! What are you grimacing for? Why are you so important because you've a great man in the house?" Anania guessed at some secret and said. "What's the matter? Tell me. What's being said about me?" "Nothing, nothing; let the crows caw," said the woman. The lad was disturbed. Had something been heard at Nuoro of Maria Obinu? He put down his fork and said he would eat no more till he heard explanation. "You're so hasty!" sighed the old woman. "King Solomon says the hasty man is like the wind----" "Oh King Solomon still? I was hoping you'd forgotten him," said the young man roughly. She was silent, rather hurt. Her husband looked at her, then at Anania, and wished to punish him. "King Solomon always said the truth. But what they're saying in Nuoro is that you're making love to Margherita Carboni." Anania flushed. He resumed his fork and ate mechanically, while he stammered-- "The fools!"