She still looked at him with surprise.
"But a fisherman has few soldi, signorino."
"Maddalena," he said, letting the oars drift in the water, "there's only
one good thing in the world, and that is to be free in a life that is
natural to one."
He drew up his feet onto the wooden bench and clasped his hands round his
knees, and sat thus, looking at her while she faced him in the stern of
the boat. He had not turned the boat round. So Maddalena had her face
towards the land, while his was set towards the open sea.
"It isn't having many soldi that makes happiness," he went on. "Gaspare
thinks it is, and Lucrezia, and I dare say your father would--"
"Oh yes, signore! In Sicily we all think so!"
"And so they do in England. But it isn't true."
"But if you have many soldi you can do anything."
He shook his head.
"No you can't. I have plenty of soldi, but I can't always live here, I
can't always live as I do now. Some day I shall have to go away from
Sicily--I shall have to go back and live in London."
As he said the last words he seemed to see London rise up before him in
the night, with shadowy domes and towers and chimneys; he seemed to hear
through the exquisite silence of night upon the sea the mutter of its
many voices.
"It's beastly there! It's beastly!"
And he set his teeth almost viciously.
"Why must you go, then, signorino?"
"Why? Oh, I have work to do."
"But if you are rich why must you work?"
"Well--I--I can't explain in Italian. But my father expects me to."
"To get more rich?"
"Yes, I suppose."
"But if you are rich why cannot you live as you please?"
"I don't know, Maddalena. But the rich scarcely ever live really as they
please, I think. Their soldi won't let them, perhaps."
"I don't understand, signore."
"Well, a man must do something, must get on, and if I lived always here I
should do nothing but enjoy myself."
He was silent for a minute. Then he said: "And that's all I want to do, just to enjoy myself here in the sun."
"Are you happy here, signorino?"
"Yes, tremendously happy."
"Why?"
"Why--because it's Sicily here! Aren't you happy?"