“Why haven’t you been to see us, Natale Marzuchetti?” Miss Lorini asked cheerfully in Italian. “Mrs. Bishop was sure you would come.”
“He does not look like the same child!” whispered Betty to her aunt, who now pushed forward.
“Ask him if he is a smart boy in school, and if he is not glad to be dressed so decently and to be learning something useful,” Mrs. Bishop said hurriedly to the Italian lady, all of which was repeated to Natale in his own language as was requested. But Natale only shook his head slowly and wistfully.
“You used to talk fast enough!” Mrs. Bishop cried impatiently. “Look,” she went on, pointing to the next house, a little farther on, “don’t you see that white stone in the wall? The words on it tell about a man who was born there, two hundred and fifty years ago, who was so good and useful that the people here put his name up there that he might never be forgotten. What’s to hinder there being a stone put up on this house, to tell about little Natale who was only a poor circus boy, but who came to live here when he was eight years old and became a very useful and good man? Tell him, Miss Lorini, just what I say!” And Mrs. Bishop pointed from the memorial tablet in one house to the blank front wall of the other, while Luigi, peering out of his window between the flower pots, dodged behind a tall geranium, and hoped the sharp eyes of the old lady were not searching for him.
Natale listened gravely to Miss Lorini’s communication, his eyes passing carelessly from the memorial tablet to the wall of an opposite house.
There was a rude painting on this wall of a Madonna holding a baby in her arms, and it was protected from the weather by a shallow arch of masonry. As Natale looked at the picture, he was reminded in some mysterious way of Nonna, who was never without a child in her arms, unless she were bending over a fountain washing the children’s clothes. A new look sprang into his eyes.
“Our Antonio had his name printed in Egypt and in Turkey and in Greece!” he answered proudly, for the first time opening his lips. “I would rather be like that than have my name cut here on the priest’s house!”
“Good for the little chap,” cried the gentleman softly. He had understood what the shrill little voice said.
“Printed on what, child? What was ‘our Antonio’s’ name printed on, in all those places?” Miss Lorini asked.
“On paper, of course,” answered the child simply. “And there were pictures of him too, all red and yellow and blue, performing on the bars. Everybody in the streets was looking at his name and the pictures.” The little fellow’s face was glowing as he spoke of his friend, and Miss Lorini had not the heart to translate his words to Mrs. Bishop, who could hardly have passed them by calmly.