They chose a table close to the edge of the terrace, near a big terra-cotta vase filled with scarlet geraniums. The blood-red blossoms, gleaming with electric light, stood out against the violet dusk. All Italy was in these flowers burning against the night sky.
The meal that followed was veiled with poetry for them both. For Amaldi because he loved her; for Sophy because she loved Italy. They were also very hungry, and it is odd how it increases sympathy for two young and hungry people to eat together. Sophy felt that she had known Amaldi a long time when they rose from the little iron table on the terrace of Isola Pescatori.
They went for a stroll through the crooked streets. As they passed the Village Church--Sophy hesitated, then entered. He followed and they stood side by side, glancing about them. Three peasant women and a man were kneeling on the dark benches. The women glanced up at the _forestieri_, frankly curious; only the man kept his anxious, faded blue eyes on the image of the Virgin, that, life-sized and brightly tinted, held out compassionate hands towards the suppliant. His lips moved rapidly, without ceasing. Sophy imagined that he was pleading for the life of some one dear to him--a little child maybe. She just touched Amaldi's arm, and they went out again.
"I'm afraid it jarred on you--my going in there," she said softly, looking up into his face in the gloom of the narrow street. "But the places where the poor worship always draw me--they seem so real--I can't explain--but they move me--deeply."
"I understand," said Amaldi. "It is so with me, too."
"The faith of the simple-hearted is always moving," he said. "It isn't the faith of the people I question. It is the good faith of the Roman Catholic Church towards the people."
"I see," Sophy said thoughtfully. Then she turned to him again.
"You are so much more serious about it than the other Italians I've known, who were anti-clerical. They seemed just to shrug their shoulders over it--took it half laughingly."
"A man shouldn't take it with a shrug or half laughingly that the women of his country are under the thumb of a hierarchy," said Amaldi with some vehemence. "There is a great hour coming for women, all over the world--yet a true Italian can't wish this for his country-women, as long as their fuller power would be just another weapon in the hands of priests."