“Now,” he said to Dick, “I can take time to ask you for your autograph.”
Dick felt foolish, but he signed a note for the young Italian. Enrico thanked the young lieutenant profusely, and then said very seriously, “You know the opera company is singing Cavalleria Rusticana tonight. I’m really not up to it. It would be a great treat for me to sit in the audience. How about it, Ricardo Donnelli, will you sing Turridu tonight?”
“Bravo,” cried Tomaso with a wave of his hand and his black eyes sparkling. “The great Donnelli it is for tonight.”
“No, no,” Dick protested. “I’m not a singer these days, I’m a soldier.”
“Forget it, big boy,” exclaimed Vince Salamone with affection and not without humor, for he was a good foot taller than Dick. “You’re going to be Turridu tonight and capture the hearts of all the girls in Maletta.”
“You bet you are,” agreed Tony. “He’s my favorite opera hero, and I’d like to hear his role sung proper-like.” Adding with a mock-serious bow to Enrico, “No offense to you, my good fellow.”
And Max Burckhardt exclaimed in his good-natured way, “No kiddin’, Lieutenant. I’d like to find out first hand if all the hullabaloo I hear about those vocal chords of yours is on the level.”
Boom-Boom Slade came out of his customary reticence to add, “It would give me the keenest pleasure, Lieutenant Donnelly, to hear a man sing whose talents as a soldier I so deeply respect.”
So that evening they all went to see Ricardo Donnelli in Cavalleria Rusticana. But the next morning it was Lieutenant Dick Donnelly that reported to his commanding officer at the front lines.