Abbondio has spent all night pondering his dilemma. The one thing he won't do is marry Renzo and Lucia tomorrow. He gets up in the morning and goes to see Renzo, a "filadore de seta." I don't know what that is yet, but it is a humble but not too humble profession. He makes excuses why he can't peform the wedding today. There are formalities left to do. He uses some Latin to obfuscate. Renzo gets angry. Abbondio says to wait 15 days, or a week maybe. Renzo, on the way to see Lucia, runs into the priest's servant, Perpetua. He gets out of her that the reason why he can't be married, someone from the class of the "prepotenti" is to blame. The powerful, arrogant ones. He runs to Abbondio's house, threatens him, and gets the name of don Rodrigo. The priest could be killed just for telling him this name. Renzo has murder in his heart, wants to go kill Rodrigo, but knows the mansion is guarded by bravi outside and in. He goes to see Lucia and breaks the news to her. She knows something about why don Rodrigo does not want them to be married, but we don't yet know. Lucia tell her mother...
The motto for this chapter might be "Non si tratta di torto o di ragione; si tratta di forza." [It's not a question of wrong or right, but of force / power / violence.] The chapter is mostly scenes of dialogue, and is quite quick and easy to read.
3 comments:
Silk spinner.
Right. LIke "hilador de seda" in Spanish. I should have gotten that!, but the word "seta" made me think instead of setas or mushrooms.
I think there's a sound-change rule at work there, as with horno = forno (probably with "seda" too).
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