She put her mending aside and with a quiet hand on his shoulder said, "I think I know. It is Bianca who is gone this time. Your father, too, is troubled. All night long he can't sleep."
Giorgio did not ask the fate of the blind mare. He knew. But in his sorrow he clung to a frail thread of comfort. After his voice steadied he asked, "When a creature goes to die, do you believe...." The words came strained, begging for help, trying to find a way to ask it. "That is, do you think a newborn comes to take the place of the other?"
The mother understood the boy's need. Slowly, thoughtfully, she said, "This I have pondered also." Then a look of triumph lighted her face, as if two things suddenly fitted together. "Si!" she said with conviction, "when one leaves this life, another must come into it. Yesterday," she went on, "when I was washing our bed linen at the public washbasins, a farmer from Magliano Toscano galloped by." She drove her needle in and out of a button already sewn fast. "He was followed by a veterinarian on a second beast. They were in a very great hurry. You see," she added with a quick catch of her breath, "the farmer's mare had been bred to the Arabian stallion, Sans Souci, and she was due to foal. Her colt, of course, would be of royal blood!"
"Well, did she?"
The mother's hand made the sign of the cross. Then she looked happily at Giorgio and her voice was full of assurance. "She did! The news today carried all the way to our market-place. Her colt, Giorgio, is a filly. And she has the eyes to see!"
