CONTENTS
| CHAPTER | PAGE | |
| I. | —A goddess scorned | [1] |
| II. | —Casa Di Bello | [18] |
| III. | —A spot of yellow paint | [37] |
| IV. | —Juno the Superb | [44] |
| V. | —The First Lady | [57] |
| VI. | —Carolina resolves to go courting | [75] |
| VII. | —A flutter in the Tomato Bank | [82] |
| VIII. | —Juno performs a miracle | [94] |
| IX. | —The Perpetua meets a bear | [102] |
| X. | —Birth of the Last Lady | [114] |
| XI. | —A race to the swift | [123] |
| XII. | —The peace preserved | [143] |
| XIII. | —The peace disturbed | [153] |
| XIV. | —Yellow boots and orange blossoms | [172] |
| XV. | —Failure of Banca Tomato | [186] |
| XVI. | —The Last Lady unmasked | [211] |
| XVII. | —The falcon saves the dove | [228] |
| XVIII. | —At the altar of San Patrizio | [238] |
| XIX. | —Events wait upon the dandelions | [255] |
| XX. | —A house divided | [268] |
| XXI. | —The feast of springtide | [278] |
| XXII. | —Carolina constructs a drama | [292] |
| XXIII. | —A partnership in ten-inch St. Peters | [308] |
| XXIV. | —Two troublesome wedding gifts | [314] |
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
| FACING PAGE | |
| Flowers for a Neapolitan of the Porto! | [Frontispiece] |
| Would Genoa be the same when his Juno and Peacock should be there? | [5] |
| Bertino’s arrival at Paradise Park | [20] |
| The bear-tamer’s wife | [109] |
| “A broken leg! Dio Santo!” | [111] |
| It was a wild thrust | [170] |
| Bridget in balia array | [189] |
| Jack Tar’s ignoble end | [196] |
| The Last Lady as Queen of the Feast | [287] |
THE LAST LADY OF MULBERRY
CHAPTER I
A GODDESS SCORNED
All Armando knew of sculpture he had learned from his uncle Daniello, a mountain craftsman who never chiselled anything greater than a ten-inch Saint Peter. At night in the tavern on the craggy height, with a flask of barbera before him, the old carver would talk grandly of his doings in art, while his comrades, patient of the oft-told tale, nodded their heads in listless but loyal accord. They all knew very well that it was young Armando who did most of the carving, yet they cried “Bravo!” for old Daniello’s wine was good. And so it had been for a long time. While the lad chipped all day in a little workshop perched beyond the nether cloud shadows, his uncle passed the hours in Genoa, where, by sharp wits and bland tongue, he transmuted the marble into silver.
But Armando had a soul that looked far above the gleaming tonsures of ten-inch Saint Peters. Wherefore he was unhappy. When his twentieth birthday dawned it seemed to him that his life had been a failure. One morning, after a night of much barbera and noisy gasconade, old Daniello did not wake up, and two days afterward they laid him to rest in the sloping graveyard in the gorge by the olive-oil mill.