"It's cert'nly a grand little thing t' break trainin', lady. This here sculptor game is a hard life. Y' been pipin' me ear, ain't y'?"
Aunt Caroline lifted a hand in embarrassed protest and tried to murmur a disclaimer.
"W'y, it's all right, lady," said the signor, with generous reassurance. "It's one o' me trade-marks. Say, y'd never guess how I got it. Listen: I landed on it when I did a Brodie off a scaffold in th' sixteenth chapel. Uhuh; down in Rome."
"Sistine!" It was a violent whisper from Bill.
"Sistine," repeated the signor. "That's wot hung it on me, lady. I was up there a coupla hundred feet—easy that—copyin' off one o' them statues of Mike th' Angelus. You know th' guy; one o' th' old champs. All of a sudden, off I goes an' down on me ear. Gee, lady, it had me down f'r nine all right; but I wasn't out. Ain't never been out yet. So I goes up again an' finishes th' job in th' next round. That's th' kind of a bird I am, lady."
Aunt Caroline nodded dumbly. So did the bishop.
"I got th' twisted beezer in th' same mixup," added the signor, as he scratched his nose reflectively. "First I lit on me ear an' then I rolled over on me nose. But, gee; that's nothin'. Guys in my game gotta have noive."
"It would appear to require much courage," ventured the bishop.
"You said it," advised the signor. "But y' gotta have noive in any game, bish. Yes, ma'am; y' gotta have guts."