Page:The Atlantic Monthly Volume 52.djvu/22

am the son of a peasant and of a peasant's wife. I am anything you please, but I will marry her if I say I will. Do you think it is for nothing that you have taught me the language of Dante, of Petrarca, of Silvio Pellico? Do you think it is for nothing that Heaven has given me my voice? Do not the angels love music, and cannot I make as good songs as they? Or do you think that because I am bred a singer my hand is not as strong as a fine gentleman's—contadino as I am? I will—I will and I will, Basta!"

I never saw him look like that before. He had folded his arms, and he nodded his head a little at each repetition of the word, looking at me so hard, as we stood under the gas lamp in the street, that I was obliged to turn my eyes away. He stared me out of countenance—he, a peasant boy! Then we walked on.

"And as for her being a wax doll, as you call her," he continued, after a little time, "that is nonsense, if you want the word to be used. Truly, a doll! And the next minute you compare her to the Madonna! I am sure she has a heart as big as this," and he stretched out his hands into the air. "I can see it in her eyes. Ah, what eyes!"

I saw it was no use arguing on that tack, and I felt quite sure that he would forget all about it, though he looked so determined, and talked so grandly about his will.

"Nino," I said, "I am older than you." I said this to impress him, of course, for I am not really so very old.

"Diamini!" he cried impertinently, "I believe it!"

"Well, well, do not be impatient. I have seen something in my time, and I tell you those foreign women are not like ours, a whit. I fell in love, once, with a northern fairy,—she was not German, but she came from Lombardy, you see,—and that is the reason why I lost Serveti and all the rest."

"But I have no Serveti to lose," objected Nino.

"You have a career as a musician to lose. It is not much of a career, to be stamping about with a lot of figuranti and scene-shifters, and screaming yourself hoarse every night." I was angry, because he laughed at my age. it is a career, after all, that you have chosen for yourself. If you get mixed up in an intrigue now, you may ruin yourself. I hope you will."

"Grazie! And then?"

"Eh, it might not be such a bad thing after all. For if you could be induced to give up the stage"—

"I—I give up singing?" he cried, indignantly.

"Oh, such things happen, you know. If you were to give it up, as I was saying, you might then possibly use your mind. A mind is a much better thing than a throat, after all."

"Ebbene! talk as much as you please, for, of course, you have the right, for you have brought me up, and you have certainly opposed my singing enough to quiet your conscience. But, dear professor, I will do all that I say, and if you will give me a little help in this matter, you will not repent it."

"Help? Dio mio! What do you take me for? As if I could help you, or would! I suppose you want money to make yourself a dandy, a paino, to go and stand at the corner of the Piazza Colonna and ogle her as she goes by! In truth! You have fine projects."

"No," said Nino, quietly, "I do not want any money, or anything else, at present, thank you. And do not be angry, but come into the caffè and drink some lemonade; and I will invite you to it, for I have been paid for my last copying, that I sent in yesterday." He put his arm in mine, and we went in. There is no resisting Nino, when he is affectionate. But I would not let him pay for the lemonade. I paid for it myself. What extravagance!