'Hey! the old way! Give him knuckles, and break his back, my boy!' cried the soldiers; 'none of their steel this side of the mountain.'
Johann waited for Angelo to lift his hands; and to instigate his reluctant adversary, thumped his chest; but Angelo did not move. The soldiers roared.
'If she has you, she shall have a dolly,' said Johann, now heated with the prospect of presenting that sort of husband to his little Rosetta. At this juncture Jacopo threw himself between them.
'It shall be a real fight,' he said; 'my daughter can't make up her mind, and she shall have the best man. Leave me to arrange it all fairly; and you come here in a couple of hours, my children,' he addressed the soldiers, who unwillingly quitted the scene where there was a certainty of fun, on the assurance of there being a livelier scene to come.
When they had turned their heels on the shop, Jacopo made a face at Johann; Johann swung round upon Angelo, and met a smile. Then followed explanations.
'What's that you say? She's true—she's true?' exclaimed the astounded lover.
'True enough, but a girl at an inn wants hotter courting,' said Jacopo. 'His Excellency here is after his own sweetheart.'
Johann huzzaed, hugged at Angelo's hands, and gave a lusty filial tap to Jacopo on the shoulder. Bread and grapes and Tyrolese wine were placed for them, and Johann's mother soon produced a salad, eggs, and fowl; and then and there declared her willingness to receive Rosetta into the household, 'if she would swear at the outset never to have 'heimweh' (home-longing); as people—men and women, both—always did when they took a new home across a mountain.'
'She won't—will she?' Johann inquired with a dubious sparkle.
'Not she,' said Jacopo.