He turned to drink, looking at the wine through the rosy light of the rude iron lamp. It was thick and he scarcely tasted it. Then he rubbed his mouth and seeing that the old grey napkin was torn, he put it over his face and looked through a hole, saying: "Do you remember the night Zuanne and I dressed up? I put this very cloth over my head like this----But what's the matter?" he exclaimed, suddenly throwing the napkin down and changing his tone. His face had turned pale. He saw that the widow's countenance, generally cadaverous and expressionless, had become strongly animated, showing first surprise then pity. He understood at once he was himself the object of her pity. The edifice of his dream fell into ruin, broken to atoms for all time. "_Nonna_! Aunt Grathia! you know!" he cried apprehensively, his nervous fingers stretching the old cloth to its full length. "Eat your supper. Then we'll talk. No, finish eating!" said the old woman, recovering herself. "Don't you like the wine?" But Anania sprang to his feet. "Speak!" he cried. "Ah, Holy Lord! what do you expect me to say?" lamented the old woman, sighing and mumbling her lips; "why don't you go on with your supper? We can have a talk afterwards." He no longer heard or saw. "Speak! speak! I see you know. Where is she? Is she alive? Is she dead? Where is she? Where is she? Where is she?" He repeated the question twenty times, roaming automatically round the kitchen, turning and returning, stretching the cloth, putting it over his face. He seemed almost mad, angry rather than grieved. "Hush! hush!" said the old woman going to his side. "I had supposed you knew. Yes--she's alive; but she's not the woman who has deceived you by pretending to be your mother." "She didn't pretend, Nonna! It was my own fancy. She doesn't even know I thought it! Ah--then it's not she!" he added in a low voice, as much shocked as if till that moment he had been certain of his discovery. "Go on!" he exclaimed. "Why are you keeping me on the rack? Why have you not alluded to her? Where is she? Where is she?" "Perhaps she has never left Sardinia," said the widow, walking by his side. "Really I thought you knew and that you didn't think it mattered. I saw her this year, early in May. She came to Fonni for the Feast of the Martyrs, with a singer, a blind man, her lover. They had walked from Neoneli, a long way. She had malaria and was like an old woman of sixty. The blind man took a lot of money at the Feast, and after it was over he joined a company of beggars going to a feast in another part of the country. He left her behind. In June or July I heard she was harvesting in the _tancas_ of Mamojada. The fever was killing her. She was ill a long time in the _Cantoniera de su Gramene_, and she's there still." Anania lifted his head and opened his arms with a gesture of despair. "I--I saw her!" he cried. "I saw her! I saw her! Are you certain of all this?" he asked gazing hard at the old woman.