IV
Teresa demanded to be left alone with her child and the child of her child, and because of her voice and the look in her eyes, Fabio left them alone. The room was shrouded in comparative darkness. Four thin, brown candles guarded the bed. From the little red lamp in front of the Virgin came a fitful, flickering glimmer. Teresa stood over the slender body, gazing down with her hard, black eyes; then she turned and lifted the baby from his basket, a tiny lump of protesting flesh muffled in folds of flannel. From her fumed-oak bracket the Virgin watched with a gentle, deprecating smile. She could not help that deprecating smile—it was molded into plaster. Majestically, Teresa turned and faced her, and they looked at each other eye to eye. Then Teresa thrust the baby towards her, and the gesture was one of repudiation.
“Take him!” said Teresa. “I give him to you, I have no use for him. He has stolen my joy, he has killed my child, and you, you have let him do it—therefore, you can have him, body and soul, but you cannot any longer have Teresa Boselli. Teresa Boselli has done with prayer, for you cannot answer and God cannot answer—possibly neither of you exists—but if you do exist, then I give this thing to you—do as you like with it, play with it, crush it, as you crushed its mother over there!”
Fabio came up quietly behind her; he had stolen back to her unperceived. He took the baby from her very gently.
“Little Gian-Luca come to Nonno,” he murmured, pressing his cheek against the child.