"Buon giorno! Buon giorno!" He opened wide his arms to welcome his friends who came laughing and breathless to greet him. One other boy brought a sagging umbrella, and a girl carried a pitcher with a broken snout. They, with Giorgio, placed their crippled possessions at his feet, like precious offerings laid before a god.
Before starting to work, Uncle Marco looked from face to face, beaming. He was actor as well as tinker. He had certain little curtain-raiser habits to whet the excitement. First he made a ritual of taking off his hat, running his fingers over the bright glinting feathers, and putting it back on again at a rakish angle. Then while his audience watched in growing impatience, he took a copper mug from his pocket, and let the fountain water flow into it. He drank long and heartily, sucking the water through his ragged red whiskers with a loud hissing sound.
"Bello! Bello!" he sang out. "No water so delicious as water of Monticello!" His voice rolled strong and vibrant, full of the juices of living. "Bello, bello—Monticello!" he sang again, clapping his hands, chuckling over his rhyme.
At last, with a grand flourish, he unhooked the pack on his back and spread out its contents on the cobblestones.
The children craned their necks to see umbrella ribs made of canewood, patches of green and black and purple cloth, rolls of thin wire, an old fish tin, a needle curved like a serpent's tongue, and a wondrous drill that looked for all the world like a bow and arrow. With a jovial wink in Giorgio's direction, the Umbrella Man now took up the broken bake dish.
"Giorgio Terni!" he pronounced in his best stage voice. "With you we begin. Of the world beyond the mountain, what is it you want to know? Ask, boy."
Giorgio's heart beat wildly. He swallowed; he gulped. Emilio, his little brother, and Teria, his sister, crowded in on him, nudging him with their elbows. "Ask it!" they urged. "Ask!"
Giorgio knew what to ask, but he muffled and stammered the words so they ran all together. "YoujustcomefromSiena?" he whispered.
"Eh? Speak out. Speak out, boy! Forte!"
"You just come from over the mountain? From city of Siena?" This time the question could be heard by everyone, even by people leaning out the windows.