Chapter 13

"I shall wait for you outside!" I felt ill at ease; my wrath had simmered away; I repented. No; Coretti could not have done it intentionally. He is good, I thought. I recalled how I had seen him in his own home; how he had worked and helped his sick mother; and then how heartily he had been welcomed in my house; and how he had pleased my father. What would I not have given not to have said that word to him; not to have insulted him thus! And I thought of the advice that my father had given to me: "Have you done wrong?"--"Yes."--"Then beg his pardon." But this I did not dare to do; I was ashamed to humiliate myself. I looked at him out of the corner of my eye, and I saw his coat ripped on the shoulder,--perhaps because he had carried too much wood,--and I felt that I loved him; and I said to myself, "Courage!" But the words, "excuse me," stuck in my throat. He looked at me askance from time to time, and he seemed to me to be more grieved than angry. But at such times I looked malevolently at him, to show him that I was not afraid.

He repeated, "We shall meet outside!" And I said, "We shall meet outside!" But I was thinking of what my father had once said to me, "If you are wronged, defend yourself, but do not fight."

And I said to myself, "I will defend myself, but I will not fight." But I was discontented, and I no longer listened to the master. At last the moment of dismissal arrived. When I was alone in the street I perceived that he was following me. I stopped and waited for him, ruler in hand. He approached; I raised my ruler.

"No, Enrico," he said, with his kindly smile, waving the ruler aside with his hand; "let us be friends again, as before."

I stood still in amazement, and then I felt what seemed to be a hand dealing a push on my shoulders, and I found myself in his arms. He kissed me, and said:--

"We'll have no more altercations between us, will we?"

"Never again! never again!" I replied. And we parted content. But when I returned home, and told my father all about it, thinking to give him pleasure, his face clouded over, and he said:--

"You should have been the first to offer your hand, since you were in the wrong." Then he added, "You should not raise your ruler at a comrade who is better than you are--at the son of a soldier!" and snatching the ruler from my hand, he broke it in two, and hurled it against the wall.

MY SISTER.

Friday, 24th.

Why, Enrico, after our father has already reproved you for having behaved badly to Coretti, were you so unkind to me? You cannot imagine the pain that you caused me. Do you not know that when you were a baby, I stood for hours and hours beside your cradle, instead of playing with my companions, and that when you were ill, I got out of bed every night to feel whether your forehead was burning? Do you not know, you who grieve your sister, that if a tremendous misfortune should overtake us, I should be a mother to you and love you like my son? Do you not know that when our father and mother are no longer here, I shall be your best friend, the only person with whom you can talk about our dead and your infancy, and that, should it be necessary, I shall work for you, Enrico, to earn your bread and to pay for your studies, and that I shall always love you when you are grown up, that I shall follow you in thought when you go far away, always because we grew up together and have the same blood? O Enrico, be sure of this when you are a man, that if misfortune happens to you, if you are alone, be very sure that you will seek me, that you will come to me and say: "Silvia, sister, let me stay with you; let us talk of the days when we were happy--do you remember? Let us talk of our mother, of our home, of those beautiful days that are so far away." O Enrico, you will always find your sister with her arms wide open. Yes, dear Enrico; and you must forgive me for the reproof that I am administering to you now. I shall never recall any wrong of yours; and if you should give me other sorrows, what matters it? You will always be my brother, the same brother; I shall never recall you otherwise than as having held you in my arms when a baby, of having loved our father and mother with you, of having watched you grow up, of having been for years your most faithful companion. But do you write me a kind word in this same copy-book, and I will come for it and read it before the evening. In the meanwhile, to show you that I am not angry with you, and perceiving that you are weary, I have copied for you the monthly story, _Blood of Romagna_, which you were to have copied for the little sick mason. Look in the left drawer of your table; I have been writing all night, while you were asleep. Write me a kind word, Enrico, I beseech you.

THY SISTER SILVIA.

I am not worthy to kiss your hands.--ENRICO.

BLOOD OF ROMAGNA.

(_Monthly Story._)

That evening the house of Ferruccio was more silent than was its wont. The father, who kept a little haberdasher's shop, had gone to Forli to make some purchases, and his wife had accompanied him, with Luigina, a baby, whom she was taking to a doctor, that he might operate on a diseased eye; and they were not to return until the following morning. It was almost midnight. The woman who came to do the work by day had gone away at nightfall. In the house there was only the grandmother with the paralyzed legs, and Ferruccio, a lad of thirteen. It was a small house of but one story, situated on the highway, at a gunshot's distance from a village not far from Forli, a town of Romagna; and there was near it only an uninhabited house, ruined two months previously by fire, on which the sign of an inn was still to be seen. Behind the tiny house was a small garden surrounded by a hedge, upon which a rustic gate opened; the door of the shop, which also served as the house door, opened on the highway. All around spread the solitary campagna, vast cultivated fields, planted with mulberry-trees.

It was nearly midnight; it was raining and blowing. Ferruccio and his grandmother, who was still up, were in the dining-room, between which and the garden there was a small, closet-like room, encumbered with old furniture. Ferruccio had only returned home at eleven o'clock, after an absence of many hours, and his grandmother had watched for him with eyes wide open, filled with anxiety, nailed to the large arm-chair, upon which she was accustomed to pass the entire day, and often the whole night as well, since a difficulty of breathing did not allow her to lie down in bed.

It was raining, and the wind beat the rain against the window-panes: the night was very dark. Ferruccio had returned weary, muddy, with his jacket torn, and the livid mark of a stone on his forehead. He had engaged in a stone fight with his comrades; they had come to blows, as usual; and in addition he had gambled, and lost all his soldi, and left his cap in a ditch.

Although the kitchen was illuminated only by a small oil lamp, placed on the corner of the table, near the arm-chair, his poor grandmother had instantly perceived the wretched condition of her grandson, and had partly divined, partly brought him to confess, his misdeeds.

She loved this boy with all her soul. When she had learned all, she began to cry.

"Ah, no!" she said, after a long silence, "you have no heart for your poor grandmother. You have no feeling, to take advantage in this manner of the absence of your father and mother, to cause me sorrow. You have left me alone the whole day long. You had not the slightest compassion. Take care, Ferruccio! You are entering on an evil path which will lead you to a sad end. I have seen others begin like you, and come to a bad end. If you begin by running away from home, by getting into brawls with the other boys, by losing soldi, then, gradually, from stone fights you will come to knives, from gambling to other vices, and from other vices to--theft."

Ferruccio stood listening three paces away, leaning against a cupboard, with his chin on his breast and his brows knit, being still hot with wrath from the brawl. A lock of fine chestnut hair fell across his forehead, and his blue eyes were motionless.

"From gambling to theft!" repeated his grandmother, continuing to weep. "Think of it, Ferruccio! Think of that scourge of the country about here, of that Vito Mozzoni, who is now playing the vagabond in the town; who, at the age of twenty-four, has been twice in prison, and has made that poor woman, his mother, die of a broken heart--I knew her; and his father has fled to Switzerland in despair. Think of that bad fellow, whose salute your father is ashamed to return: he is always roaming with miscreants worse than himself, and some day he will go to the galleys. Well, I knew him as a boy, and he began as you are doing. Reflect that you will reduce your father and mother to the same end as his."

Ferruccio held his peace. He was not at all remorseful at heart; quite the reverse: his misdemeanors arose rather from superabundance of life and audacity than from an evil mind; and his father had managed him badly in precisely this particular, that, holding him capable, at bottom, of the finest sentiments, and also, when put to the proof, of a vigorous and generous action, he left the bridle loose upon his neck, and waited for him to acquire judgment for himself. The lad was good rather than perverse, but stubborn; and it was hard for him, even when his heart was oppressed with repentance, to allow those good words which win pardon to escape his lips, "If I have done wrong, I will do so no more; I promise it; forgive me." His soul was full of tenderness at times; but pride would not permit it to manifest itself.

"Ah, Ferruccio," continued his grandmother, perceiving that he was thus dumb, "not a word of penitence do you utter to me! You see to what a condition I am reduced, so that I am as good as actually buried. You ought not to have the heart to make me suffer so, to make the mother of your mother, who is so old and so near her last day, weep; the poor grandmother who has always loved you so, who rocked you all night long, night after night, when you were a baby a few months old, and who did not eat for amusing you,--you do not know that! I always said, 'This boy will be my consolation!' And now you are killing me! I would willingly give the little life that remains to me if I could see you become a good boy, and an obedient one, as you were in those days when I used to lead you to the sanctuary--do you remember, Ferruccio? You used to fill my pockets with pebbles and weeds, and I carried you home in my arms, fast asleep. You used to love your poor grandma then. And now I am a paralytic, and in need of your affection as of the air to breathe, since I have no one else in the world, poor, half-dead woman that I am: my God!"

Ferruccio was on the point of throwing himself on his grandmother, overcome with emotion, when he fancied that he heard a slight noise, a creaking in the small adjoining room, the one which opened on the garden. But he could not make out whether it was the window-shutters rattling in the wind, or something else.

He bent his head and listened.

The rain beat down noisily.

The sound was repeated. His grandmother heard it also.

"What is it?" asked the grandmother, in perturbation, after a momentary pause.

"The rain," murmured the boy.

"Then, Ferruccio," said the old woman, drying her eyes, "you promise me that you will be good, that you will not make your poor grandmother weep again--"

Another faint sound interrupted her.

"But it seems to me that it is not the rain!" she exclaimed, turning pale. "Go and see!"

But she instantly added, "No; remain here!" and seized Ferruccio by the hand.

Both remained as they were, and held their breath. All they heard was the sound of the water.

Then both were seized with a shivering fit.

It seemed to both that they heard footsteps in the next room.

"Who's there?" demanded the lad, recovering his breath with an effort.

No one replied.

"Who is it?" asked Ferruccio again, chilled with terror.

But hardly had he pronounced these words when both uttered a shriek of terror. Two men sprang into the room. One of them grasped the boy and placed one hand over his mouth; the other clutched the old woman by the throat. The first said:--

"Silence, unless you want to die!"

The second:--

"Be quiet!" and raised aloft a knife.

Both had dark cloths over their faces, with two holes for the eyes.

For a moment nothing was audible but the gasping breath of all four, the patter of the rain; the old woman emitted frequent rattles from her throat, and her eyes were starting from her head.

The man who held the boy said in his ear, "Where does your father keep his money?"

The lad replied in a thread of a voice, with chattering teeth, "Yonder--in the cupboard."

"Come with me," said the man.

And he dragged him into the closet room, holding him securely by the throat. There was a dark lantern standing on the floor.

"Where is the cupboard?" he demanded.

The suffocating boy pointed to the cupboard.

Then, in order to make sure of the boy, the man flung him on his knees in front of the cupboard, and, pressing his neck closely between his own legs, in such a way that he could throttle him if he shouted, and holding his knife in his teeth and his lantern in one hand, with the other he pulled from his pocket a pointed iron, drove it into the lock, fumbled about, broke it, threw the doors wide open, tumbled everything over in a perfect fury of haste, filled his pockets, shut the cupboard again, opened it again, made another search; then he seized the boy by the windpipe again, and pushed him to where the other man was still grasping the old woman, who was convulsed, with her head thrown back and her mouth open.

The latter asked in a low voice, "Did you find it?"

His companion replied, "I found it."

And he added, "See to the door."

The one that was holding the old woman ran to the door of the garden to see if there were any one there, and called in from the little room, in a voice that resembled a hiss, "Come!"

The one who remained behind, and who was still holding Ferruccio fast, showed his knife to the boy and the old woman, who had opened her eyes again, and said, "Not a sound, or I'll come back and cut your throat."

And he glared at the two for a moment.

At this juncture, a song sung by many voices became audible far off on the highway.

The robber turned his head hastily toward the door, and the violence of the movement caused the cloth to fall from his face.

The old woman gave vent to a shriek; "Mozzoni!"

"Accursed woman," roared the robber, on finding himself recognized, "you shall die!"

And he hurled himself, with his knife raised, against the old woman, who swooned on the spot.

The assassin dealt the blow.

But Ferruccio, with an exceedingly rapid movement, and uttering a cry of desperation, had rushed to his grandmother, and covered her body with his own. The assassin fled, stumbling against the table and overturning the light, which was extinguished.

The boy slipped slowly from above his grandmother, fell on his knees, and remained in that attitude, with his arms around her body and his head upon her breast.

Several moments passed; it was very dark; the song of the peasants gradually died away in the campagna. The old woman recovered her senses.

"Ferruccio!" she cried, in a voice that was barely intelligible, with chattering teeth.

"Grandmamma!" replied the lad.

The old woman made an effort to speak; but terror had paralyzed her tongue.

She remained silent for a while, trembling violently.

Then she succeeded in asking:--

"They are not here now?"

"No."

"They did not kill me," murmured the old woman in a stifled voice.

"No; you are safe," said Ferruccio, in a weak voice. "You are safe, dear grandmother. They carried off the money. But daddy had taken nearly all of it with him."

His grandmother drew a deep breath.

"Grandmother," said Ferruccio, still kneeling, and pressing her close to him, "dear grandmother, you love me, don't you?"

"O Ferruccio! my poor little son!" she replied, placing her hands on his head; "what a fright you must have had!--O Lord God of mercy!--Light the lamp. No; let us still remain in the dark! I am still afraid."

"Grandmother," resumed the boy, "I have always caused you grief."

"No, Ferruccio, you must not say such things; I shall never think of that again; I have forgotten everything, I love you so dearly!"

"I have always caused you grief," pursued Ferruccio, with difficulty, and his voice quivered; "but I have always loved you. Do you forgive me?--Forgive me, grandmother."

"Yes, my son, I forgive you with all my heart. Think, how could I help forgiving you! Rise from your knees, my child. I will never scold you again. You are so good, so good! Let us light the lamp. Let us take courage a little. Rise, Ferruccio."

"Thanks, grandmother," said the boy, and his voice was still weaker. "Now--I am content. You will remember me, grandmother--will you not? You will always remember me--your Ferruccio?"

"My Ferruccio!" exclaimed his grandmother, amazed and alarmed, as she laid her hands on his shoulders and bent her head, as though to look him in his face.

"Remember me," murmured the boy once more, in a voice that seemed like a breath. "Give a kiss to my mother--to my father--to Luigina.--Good by, grandmother."

"In the name of Heaven, what is the matter with you?" shrieked the old woman, feeling the boy's head anxiously, as it lay upon her knees; and then with all the power of voice of which her throat was capable, and in desperation: "Ferruccio! Ferruccio! Ferruccio! My child! My love! Angels of Paradise, come to my aid!"

But Ferruccio made no reply. The little hero, the saviour of the mother of his mother, stabbed by a blow from a knife in the back, had rendered up his beautiful and daring soul to God.

THE LITTLE MASON ON HIS SICK-BED.

Tuesday, 18th.

The poor little mason is seriously ill; the master told us to go and see him; and Garrone, Derossi, and I agreed to go together. Stardi would have come also, but as the teacher had assigned us the description of _The Monument to Cavour_, he told us that he must go and see the monument, in order that his description might be more exact. So, by way of experiment, we invited that puffed-up fellow, Nobis, who replied "No," and nothing more. Votini also excused himself, perhaps because he was afraid of soiling his clothes with plaster.

We went there when we came out of school at four o'clock. It was raining in torrents. On the street Garrone halted, and said, with his mouth full of bread:--

"What shall I buy?" and he rattled a couple of soldi in his pocket. We each contributed two soldi, and purchased three huge oranges. We ascended to the garret. At the door Derossi removed his medal and put it in his pocket. I asked him why.

"I don't know," he answered; "in order not to have the air: it strikes me as more delicate to go in without my medal." We knocked; the father, that big man who looks like a giant, opened to us; his face was distorted so that he appeared terrified.

"Who are you?" he demanded. Garrone replied:--

"We are Antonio's schoolmates, and we have brought him three oranges."

"Ah, poor Tonino!" exclaimed the mason, shaking his head, "I fear that he will never eat your oranges!" and he wiped his eyes with the back of his hand. He made us come in. We entered an attic room, where we saw "the little mason" asleep in a little iron bed; his mother hung dejectedly over the bed, with her face in her hands, and she hardly turned to look at us; on one side hung brushes, a trowel, and a plaster-sieve; over the feet of the sick boy was spread the mason's jacket, white with lime. The poor boy was emaciated; very, very white; his nose was pointed, and his breath was short. O dear Tonino, my little comrade! you who were so kind and merry, how it pains me! what would I not give to see you make the hare's face once more, poor little mason! Garrone laid an orange on his pillow, close to his face; the odor waked him; he grasped it instantly; then let go of it, and gazed intently at Garrone.

"It is I," said the latter; "Garrone: do you know me?" He smiled almost imperceptibly, lifted his stubby hand with difficulty from the bed and held it out to Garrone, who took it between his, and laid it against his cheek, saying:--

"Courage, courage, little mason; you are going to get well soon and come back to school, and the master will put you next to me; will that please you?"

But the little mason made no reply. His mother burst into sobs: "Oh, my poor Tonino! My poor Tonino! He is so brave and good, and God is going to take him from us!"

"Silence!" cried the mason; "silence, for the love of God, or I shall lose my reason!"

Then he said to us, with anxiety: "Go, go, boys, thanks; go! what do you want to do here? Thanks; go home!" The boy had closed his eyes again, and appeared to be dead.

"Do you need any assistance?" asked Garrone.

"No, my good boy, thanks," the mason answered. And so saying, he pushed us out on the landing, and shut the door. But we were not half-way down the stairs, when we heard him calling, "Garrone! Garrone!"

We all three mounted the stairs once more in haste.

"Garrone!" shouted the mason, with a changed countenance, "he has called you by name; it is two days since he spoke; he has called you twice; he wants you; come quickly! Ah, holy God, if this is only a good sign!"

"Farewell for the present," said Garrone to us; "I shall remain," and he ran in with the father. Derossi's eyes were full of tears. I said to him:--

"Are you crying for the little mason? He has spoken; he will recover."

"I believe it," replied Derossi; "but I was not thinking of him. I was thinking how good Garrone is, and what a beautiful soul he has."

COUNT CAVOUR.

Wednesday, 29th.

You are to make a description of the monument to Count Cavour. You can do it. But who was Count Cavour? You cannot understand at present. For the present this is all you know: he was for many years the prime minister of Piemont. It was he who sent the Piemontese army to the Crimea to raise once more, with the victory of the Cernaia, our military glory, which had fallen with the defeat at Novara; it was he who made one hundred and fifty thousand Frenchmen descend from the Alps to chase the Austrians from Lombardy; it was he who governed Italy in the most solemn period of our revolution; who gave, during those years, the most potent impulse to the holy enterprise of the unification of our country,--he with his luminous mind, with his invincible perseverance, with his more than human industry. Many generals have passed terrible hours on the field of battle; but he passed more terrible ones in his cabinet, when his enormous work might suffer destruction at any moment, like a fragile edifice at the tremor of an earthquake. Hours, nights of struggle and anguish did he pass, sufficient to make him issue from it with reason distorted and death in his heart. And it was this gigantic and stormy work which shortened his life by twenty years. Nevertheless, devoured by the fever which was to cast him into his grave, he yet contended desperately with the malady in order to accomplish something for his country. "It is strange," he said sadly on his death-bed, "I no longer know how to read; I can no longer read."