The Oil Jar and Other Stories by Luigi Pirandello Page A

with all thoughts, except one: that his happiness would now be complete because he would see his bride. Now she would have more leisure, more time to furnish their home together; and it had to be beautiful as a dream, that home, which would be the first thing he saw. Yes, he promised that he would leave the clinic with his eyes bandaged, and that he would open them there, for the first time, in his home.
    â€œSpeak to me! Speak to me! Don’t let me go on speaking alone!”
    â€œAre you getting tired?”
    â€œNo ... Ask me again, ‘Are you getting tired?’ with that voice of yours. Let me kiss it, here, on your lips, that voice of yours ... ”
    â€œYes ...”
    â€œAnd speak, now; tell me how you’ll furnish it for me, our home.”
    â€œHow?”
    â€œYes, I haven’t asked you anything yet up to now. But no, I don’t want to know anything, not even now. You will take care of it. For me it will be a marvel, an enchantment ... But I will see nothing at first: only you! only you!”
    She resolutely stifled her anguished weeping, made her face completely cheerful, and there kneeling in front of him, with him bending over her, in her embrace, she began speaking to him of her love, practically in his ear, with that voice of hers, sweeter and more bewitching than ever. But when he, in rapture, held her tight and threatened never to let her go again, at that moment she freed herself and stood straight up, as if proud of a victory over herself. There! Even now, she would have been able to tie him to her indissolubly. But no! Because she loved him.
    All that day, till late at night, she intoxicated him with that voice of hers, self-assured because he was still there, in his darkness; in the darkness in which hope was already flaring up, as beautiful as the image he had formed of her.
    The next morning she insisted on accompanying him in the carriage up to the clinic and, as she left him there, she told him she would get right to work, right away, like an industrious swallow building her nest.
    â€œYou’ll see!”
    For two days, in terrible anxiety, she awaited the result of the operation. When she heard it was successful, she waited a little longer, in the empty house; she furnished it for him lovingly. In his exultation he wanted to see her, if only for a moment, but she sent a message asking him to be patient for a few more days; if she wasn’t hurrying over, it was to avoid exciting him; it was against the doctor’s orders ...
    â€œReally? Well, in that case she would have come ... ”
    She gathered up her possessions, and the day before he left the clinic, she departed without anyone knowing, in order to remain, at least in his memory, a voice, which perhaps, now that he had emerged from his darkness, he would seek on many lips, in vain.

THE FLY
    Out of breath, panting—when they were below the village, which sits with its densely packed chalky little houses on the blue-clay plateau—to save time they climbed up the slippery slope, making use of their hands, because their large, coarse hobnailed shoes were sliding, damn it!
    The women, closely gathered and talking loudly in front of the little fountain, with their terra-cotta pitchers under their arms, turned around and fell silent in alarm when they saw those two men coming, overheated, purple in the face, drenched with sweat, worn out. Say, weren’t those two the Tortorici brothers? Yes, Neli and Saro Tortorici. Poor things! Poor things! They were unrecognizable in that state. What had happened to them? Why that desperate haste?
    Neli, the younger of the brothers, totally exhausted, had stopped to catch his breath and answer the women’s, questions; but Saro dragged him away with him by one arm.
    â€œGiurlannu Zarù, our cousin!” Neli then said, turning around, and raised one hand in a gesture of benediction.
    The women broke out into exclamations of sympathy and horror, and one