The men I scarcely
noticed at first, except that two were young and one elderly.
They were a queer party, even on a feast day, coming up purely for
pleasure, in the morning, strange, and slightly uncertain, advancing
between the vines. They greeted Maria and Paolo in loud, coarse voices.
There was something blowsy and uncertain and hesitating about the women
in particular, which made one at once notice them.
Then a picnic was arranged for them out of doors, on the grass. They sat
just in front of the house, under the olive tree, beyond the well. It
should have been pretty, the women in their cotton frocks, and their
friends, sitting with wine and food in the spring sunshine. But somehow
it was not: it was hard and slightly ugly.
But since they were picnicking out of doors, we must do so too. We were
at once envious. But Maria was a little unwilling, and then she set a
table for us.
The strange party did not speak to us, they seemed slightly uneasy and
angry at our presence. I asked Maria who they were. She lifted her
shoulders, and, after a second's cold pause, said they were people from
down below, and then, in her rather strident, shrill, slightly bitter,
slightly derogatory voice, she added:
'They are not people for you, signore.
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