that woman! Why, I know her quite well. She was here with a friend
of mine, who asked me to attend her professionally--I mean in my
professional capacity. Oh! nothing serious, but we had to communicate
with her people and I know all about her. She is not a normal woman. Of
course, that rigmarole about the cardinal is all nonsense. She is the
daughter of a fisherman of Siracusa. She did dance here once for a few
nights, but only at the Biondo, and no one noticed her, she was in one of
the back rows of the ballet. Did they tell you why she returned to
Castellinaria?"

They had said nothing about it, and my doctor, not being a friend of
Antonio and therefore not bound by any ties of omerta, gave me an account
of it.

It happened a few months previously: Mery was living in Palermo in a
hotel, and her room had a balcony; the next balcony belonged to a room
occupied by a young lady and her family, and the young lady was engaged
to an officer. One day Etna strayed on to the neighbouring balcony and
behaved in a manner that displeased the young lady whose betrothed
complained to the proprietor and Mery was requested to leave. She, of
course, saw that all this about her dog was merely a casus belli
concealing a conspiracy to insult her, and indignantly refused to go.
Next day, while the officer was sitting with his friends outside his
usual caffe, Mery happened to pass on her way to buy a stamp and post a
letter. She spoke to the officer, saying:

"You think a lot of yourself, don't you?"

The officer requested her not to address him, whereupon, taking the law
into her own hands, she went up to him and made a hole in her manners by
scratching his face. A crowd began to collect. Mery permitted herself
the use of an expression. It was a Sicilian word, my doctor told me what
it was and also its meaning; it appeared to me rather silly than
offensive, but he assured me that it is never used except by people of
the very lowest class. Mery then made more holes in her manners,
reducing them to the condition of one of her father's fishing-nets, and
was attempting to do the same with the officer's face when the crowd
interfered; Mery was hissed and handed over to the police, who prepared
her papers, took her to the railway station and turned her out of the
town.

Incidents such as this, by showing Mery that Sicily is no longer being
misgoverned by foreigners, may in time, perhaps, teach her not to
distrust profession