“Wait, wait, Luigi! just one little minute! I must bid them good-bye, ’cause they’ve been so good to me, and I’m going with you! Just one little bit or minute!” cried Glory, clasping his arm, imploringly.
The organ-grinder would be glad of her company, of any company, in fact; so he waited unquestioningly, while Glory explained, insisted, and finally overcame the expostulations of Timothy and Mary.
“Yes, she must go. Not until she had looked forever and ever could she be shut up in a ‘’sylum’ where she could look no further. When she found him, they would come back, he and she, and show them how right she was to keep on and how splendid he was. She thanked them–my, how she did thank them for their kindness, and, besides, there was Bonny Angel. If she’d dared to give up lookin’ for grandpa, as he wouldn’t have give up lookin’ for her, she must, she must, find the Angel’s folks. She couldn’t rest–nohow, never. Think o’ all them broken hearts, who’d lost such a beau-tiful darlin’ as her!”
Then she added, with many a loving look over the whole group, “But I mustn’t keep poor Luigi. He belongs to Toni, seems if, an’ Toni Salvatore can make it lively for them ’at don’t please him. So, good-bye, good-bye–everybody. Every single dear good body!”
Turning, with Bonny Angel once more in her own arms, walking backward to have the very last glimpse possible of these new friends, with eyes fast filling again, and stumbling over her long skirt that had lost its last hook, Glory Beck resumed her seemingly hopeless search.
However, she was not to depart just yet nor thus. To the surprise of all, Dennis himself now appeared in the doorway and held up his hand to detain her. Until then, he had showed but slight interest in her, and his strange staring at Bonny had been unnoticed by his wife. Now his face wore a puzzled expression and he passed his hand across his eyes as if he wished to clear his sight. He gazed with intensity upon Glory’s “Guardian” once more, and at last remarked:
“Pease in a pod. ’Tother had yellow curls. Awful trouble for them, plenty as kids are the country over. Pease in a pod. Might try it;” and turning sidewise he pointed toward the distant great house on the hill. Then he retreated to his fireside again, and Mary was left to interpret. She did so, saying:
“He’s sayin’ the ‘family’ ’s in some sort o’ trouble, though I hadn’t heard it. Though, ’course, they’ve been home only a few days an’ whatever any the other hands what’s been down to see him sence has told him he hain’t told me. But I make out ’t he thinks Looeegy’s playin’ up there on the terrace might do noh arm an’ll likely cheer ’em up a mite. That’s what I make out Dennis means. You an’ the organ-man’d best make your first stop along the road up to the big house. If they won’t pay anything to hear him play, likely they will to have him go away, bein’s they’re dreadful scared of tramps an’ such. Good-bye. Come an’ see us when you can!”
