Chapter 7: The Table Hears

Ettore Sarto put down his glass and began to clap, slowly, one hand against the other.

"Such spirit," he said. "Doesn't she have spirit? Then it won't trouble her to say it to the table."

"What table?" I said.

"The only one that counts."

Orazio rose beside me.

"Ettore."

"The rule is old, my friend. You know it better than I do."

"When a woman says she carries a made man's child, she stands before the five and says so with her own mouth."

Ettore spread his hands.

"Otherwise she's only a belly, and anyone might claim it."

Orazio's jaw worked.

"She doesn't have to," he said.

"Then it's only a belly."

"No," I said.

Both men looked at me.

"I'll say it."

We said nothing in the car until we crossed the river.

Nunzio drove with his eyes front and a mint going slowly in his cheek.

"You didn't have to stand up in there," Orazio said at last.

"He was about to say it for you."

"I was about to say something worse."

I looked at him.

"You were going to claim me," I said.

"I was going to deny it, and let you walk out clean."

I hadn't expected that.

It was so exactly the opposite of everything I had been bracing for that I had to look out the window.

"I'd rather be claimed by me," I said.

"Then you don't have to go to the hearing. I can refuse the summons. I lose a vote at the table, and nothing else."

"What happens if I don't say it?"

"Ettore tells the city you're a girl I put in a house. Every family decides you can be bought, or taken, or removed."

"And if I do?"

"If you say it in front of the five, you're covered by the table's peace for as long as you carry."

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