They danced the slow,
trailing, lilting polka-waltz round and round the small room, the
guitars and mandolines twanging rapidly, the dust rising from the soft
bricks. There were only the two English women: so men danced with men,
as the Italians love to do. They love even better to dance with men,
with a dear blood-friend, than with women.
'It's better like this, two men?' Giovanni says to me, his blue eyes
hot, his face curiously tender.
The wood-cutters and peasants take off their coats, their throats are
bare. They dance with strange intentness, particularly if they have for
partner an English Signora. Their feet in thick boots are curiously
swift and significant. And it is strange to see the Englishwomen, as
they dance with the peasants transfigured with a kind of brilliant
surprise. All the while the peasants are very courteous, but quiet. They
see the women dilate and flash, they think they have found a footing,
they are certain. So the male dancers are quiet, but even grandiloquent,
their feet nimble, their bodies wild and confident.
They are at a loss when the two English Signoras move together and laugh
excitedly at the end of the dance.
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