Bears while they chaffer, wary market-man
And voluble housewife, o’er it,—each in turn
Patting the curly calm inconscious head,
With the shambles ready round the corner there,
When the talk’s talked out and a bargain struck.
Violante sobbed the sobs and prayed the prayers (470)
And said the serpent tempted so she fell,
Till Pietro had to clear his brow apace
And make the best of matters: wrath at first,—
How else? pacification presently,
Why not?—could flesh withstand the impurpled one,
The very Cardinal, Paolo’s patron-friend?
Who, justifiably surnamed “a hinge,”
Knew where the mollifying oil should drop
To cure the creak o’ the valve,—considerate
For frailty, patient in a naughty world, (480)
He even volunteered to supervise
The rough draught of those marriage-articles
Signed in a hurry by Pietro, since revoked:
Trust’s politic, suspicion does the harm,
There is but one way to brow-beat this world,
Dumbfounder doubt, and repay scorn in kind,—
To go on trusting, namely, till faith move
Mountains.
Why, friends whose zeal cried “Caution ere too late!”— (490)
Bade “Pause ere jump, with both feet joined, on slough!—
Counselled “If rashness then, now temperance!”—
Heard for their pains that Pietro had closed eyes,
Jumped and was in the middle of the mire,
Money and all, just what should sink a man.
By the mere marriage, Guido gained forthwith
Dowry, his wife’s right; no rescinding there:
But Pietro, why must he needs ratify
One gift Violante gave, pay down one doit
Promised in first fool’s-flurry? Grasp the bag (500)
Lest the son’s service flag,—is reason and rhyme,
Above all when the son’s a son-in-law.
Words to the wind! The parents cast their lot
Into the lap o’ the daughter: and the son
Now with a right to lie there, took what fell,
Pietro’s whole having and holding, house and field,
Goods, chattels and effects, his worldly worth
Present and in perspective, all renounced
In favour of Guido. As for the usufruct—
The interest now, the principal anon, (510)
Would Guido please to wait, at Pietro’s death:
Till when, he must support the couple’s charge,
Bear with them, housemates, pensionaries, pawned
To an alien for fulfilment of their pact.
Guido should at discretion deal them orts,
Bread-bounty in Arezzo the strange place,—
They who had lived deliciously and rolled
Rome’s choicest comfit ’neath the tongue before.
Into this quag, “jump” bade the Cardinal!
And neck-deep in a minute there flounced they. (520)
Four months’ experience of how craft and greed,
Quickened by penury and pretentious hate
Of plain truth, brutify and bestialise,—
Four months’ taste of apportioned insolence,
Cruelty graduated, dose by dose
Of ruffianism dealt out at bed and board,
And lo, the work was done, success clapped hands.
The starved, stripped, beaten brace of stupid dupes
Broke at last in their desperation loose, (530)
Fled away for their lives, and lucky so;
Found their account in casting coat afar
And bearing off a shred of skin at least:
Left Guido lord o’ the prey, as the lion is,
And, careless what came after, carried their wrongs
To Rome,—I nothing doubt, with such remorse
As folly feels, since pain can make it wise,
But crime, past wisdom, which is innocence,
Needs not be plagued with till a later day.
In hope that memory not quite extinct
Of cheery days and festive nights would move
Friends and acquaintance—after the natural laugh,
And tributary “Just as we foretold—”
To show some bowels, give the dregs o’ the cup,
Scraps of the trencher, to their host that was,
Or let him share the mat with the mastiff, he
Who lived large and kept open house so long.
Not so Violante: ever a-head i’ the march,
Quick at the bye-road and the cut-across, (550)
She went first to the best adviser, God—
Whose finger unmistakably was felt
In all this retribution of the past.
Here was the prize of sin, luck of a lie!
But here too was the Holy Year would help,
Bound to rid sinners of sin vulgar, sin
Abnormal, sin prodigious, up to sin
Impossible and supposed for Jubilee’ sake:
To lift the leadenest of lies, let soar
The soul unhampered by a feather-weight. (560)
“I will,” said she, “go burn out this bad hole
“That breeds the scorpion, baulk the plague at least
“Its hope of further creeping progeny:
“I will confess my fault, be punished, yes,
“But pardoned too: Saint Peter pays for all.”
Through the great door new-broken for the nonce
Marched, muffled more than ever matron-wise,
Up the left nave to the formidable throne,
Fell into file with this the poisoner (570)
And that the parricide, and reached in turn
The poor repugnant Penitentiary
Set at this gully-hole o’ the world’s discharge
To help the frightfullest of filth have vent,
And then knelt down and whispered in his ear
How she had bought Pompilia, palmed the babe
On Pietro, passed the girl off as
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