“Oh, diavolo! What do it matter which it is, if de fireworks will alla be—how you say—spilt?”
“Spoilt,” he corrected gloomily.
“Che lingua di animali, questa English linguage! Where issa John Gumm?”
“In the tap-room,” Caleb informed her.
“Drinking! Drinking,” she shrilled. “Why you don’ta to keep him notta to drink before we are finished?”
John Gumm who was Madame’s chief firer had already imperilled by his habits several of her performances.
“Somebody musta go and putta clothes on de fireworks. Non voglio che abbiamo un fiasco,[2] I don’ta wish it. You hear me, Caleb?”
[2] “I do not want us to have a fiasco.”
Caleb was used to these outbursts of nervous anxiety before every display, and on most evenings he would have humoured Madame by bullying the various assistants and have enjoyed giving such an exhibition of his authority. But this evening he would not have been sorry to see the damp air make the whole display such a fiasco as Madame feared, for he bitterly resented the public appearance of Letizia Oriano, not so much for the danger of the proposed feat, but for the gratification the sight of her shapely legs would afford the crowd. In fact when Madame had summoned him to her side, he was actually engaged in a bitter argument with Letizia herself and had even gone so far as to beg her to defy her mother and refuse to make the fire-clad descent.
“There won’t be enough dew to prevent the firing,” he argued. “And more’s the pity,” he added, gathering boldness as jealousy began once more to rack him. “More’s the pity, I say, when you’re letting your only child expose her—expose herself to danger.” He managed to gulp back the words he just lacked the courage to fling at her, and though his heart beat “Jezebel! Jezebel!” he dared not say it out.