Signorina Palmeri’s eyes were turned anxiously questioning towards her. Now the new blow was coming. She gathered all her courage to meet it.
“What do you wish me to do for you, god-sister?” said Giannita. “Do you know what I thought as I was walking through the streets? I will ask her if she will go with me to Diamante, I thought. I know an old house there, where we could live cheaply. And I would embroider and sew, so that we could support ourselves. When I was out in the street I thought that it might be, but now I understand that it is impossible, impossible. You require something more of life; but tell me if I can do anything for you. You shall not thrust me away, for God has sent me.”
The signorina bent towards Giannita. “Well?” she said anxiously.
“You shall let me do what I can for you, for I love you,” said Giannita, and fell on her knees and put her arms about her.
“Have you nothing else to say?” asked the signorina.
“I wish I had,” said Giannita, “but I am only a poor girl.”
It was wonderful to see how the features of the young signorina’s face softened; how her color came back and how her eyes began to shine. Now it was plain that she had great beauty.
“Giannita,” she said, low and scarcely audibly, “do you think that it is a miracle? Do you think that God can let a miracle come to pass for my sake?”
“I prayed the Christchild that he should help me, and he sends you to me. Do you think that it was the Christchild who sent you, Giannita?”
“Then God has not forsaken me, Giannita?”
The god-sisters sat and wept for a while. It was quite quiet in the room. “When you came, Giannita, I thought that nothing was left me but to kill myself,” she said at last. “I did not know where to turn, and God hated me.”
“But tell me now what I can do for you, god-sister,” said Giannita.
As an answer the other drew her to her and kissed her.
“But it is enough that you are sent by the little Christchild,” she said. “It is enough that I know that God has not forsaken me.”
Micaela Palmeri was on her way to Diamante with Giannita.
They had taken their places in the post-carriage at three o’clock in the morning, and had driven up the beautiful road over the lower slopes of Etna, circling round the mountain. But it had been quite dark. They had not seen anything of the surrounding country.
