The landlady had already quitted the room. She returned in a few minutes, leading, or rather pulling forward a lad apparently sixteen or seventeen years of age. He was tall and stout for his years; but his beardless face and boyish features, together with a shuffling bashfulness in his gait, caused the hopes of the manager to fall to the ground more rapidly than they had risen.
“Him!” he exclaimed in utter astonishment; “him!—why, he is a child!”
“A child!” repeated the landlady;—“and must not everything have a beginning? He is a child that will make his own way in the world, I promise you.”
“But he is not fit for an actor,” said the director, surveying, with a look of disappointment, the youth who aspired to represent the Emperors of Rome and the Tribunes of the Italian republics.
“Have a little patience,” persisted the dame. “When you see his gestures—his action, you will sing another song. Come forward, Louis, my boy, and show the Signore what you can do.”
The overgrown lad cast his great eyes to the ground, and hung his head; but on further urging from his patroness, he advanced a pace or two, threw over his arms the somewhat frayed skirt of his great coat to serve as a drapery, and recited some tragic verses of Dante.
“That is not bad!”—cried the Impressario, drawing his breath. “What is your name, my lad?”
“Luigi,” was the reply, with a not ungraceful bow.
“What else?”
“He is called simply Luigi,” interposed the hostess, with an air of mystery; “he has reasons at present for concealing his family name; for you see—he has broken bounds—”