“Yes; Michael Francis Xavier Kelly. A South Boston Mick he was, and one of the finest, squarest boys that ever drew breath. Well, poor Mike was dead when I got to him, so my trip had been for nothing, and if he had been alive I could not have prevented his being taken. As it was, he was dead and I was a prisoner. So nothing was gained and, for me, personally, a good deal was lost. It wasn't a brilliant thing to do. But,” he added apologetically, “a chap doesn't have time to think collectively in such a scrape. And it was my first real scrap and I was frightened half to death, besides.”
“Frightened! Why, I never heard anything so ridiculous! What—”
“One moment, Madeline.” It was Mrs. Fosdick who interrupted. “I want to ask—er—Albert a question. I want to ask him if during his long imprisonment he composed—wrote, you know. I should have thought the sights and experiences would have forced one to express one's self—that is, one to whom the gift of expression was so generously granted,” she added, with a gracious nod.
Albert hesitated.
“Why, at first I did,” he said. “When I first was well enough to think, I used to try to write—verses. I wrote a good many. Afterwards I tore them up.”
“Tore them up!” Both Mrs. and Miss Fosdick uttered this exclamation.
“Why, yes. You see, they were such rot. The things I wanted to write about, the things I had seen and was seeing, the—the fellows like Mike and their pluck and all that—well, it was all too big for me to tackle. My jingles sounded, when I read them over, like tunes on a street piano. I couldn't do it. A genius might have been equal to the job, but I wasn't.”
Mrs. Fosdick glanced at her husband. There was something of alarmed apprehension in the glance. Madeline's next remark covered the situation. It expressed the absolute truth, so much more of the truth than even the young lady herself realized at the time.
“Why, Albert Speranza,” she exclaimed, “I never heard you speak of yourself and your work in that way before. Always—ALWAYS you have had such complete, such splendid confidence in yourself. You were never afraid to attempt ANYTHING. You MUST not talk so. Don't you intend to write any more?”
Albert looked at her. “Oh, yes, indeed,” he said simply. “That is just what I do intend to do—or try to do.”