"We will pray for her soul!" answered Jackeymo, solemnly. "But she was very old, and had been a long time ailing. Let it not grieve the Padrone too keenly, at that age, and with those infirmities, death comes as a friend."
"Peace be to her dust!" returned the Italian. "If she had her faults, be they now forgotten for ever; and in the hour of my danger and distress, she sheltered my infant! That shelter is destroyed. This letter is from the priest, her confessor. You know that she had nothing at her own disposal to bequeath my child, and her property passes to the male heir—mine enemy."
"Traitor!" muttered Jackeymo; and his right hand seemed to feel for the weapon which the Italians of lower rank often openly wear in their girdles.
"The priest," resumed Riccabocca, calmly, "has rightly judged in removing my child as a guest from the house in which my enemy enters as lord."
"And where is the Signorina?"
"With that poor priest. See, Giacomo—here, here—this is her handwriting at the end of the letter—the first lines she ever yet traced to me."
Jackeymo took off his hat, and looked reverently on the large characters of a child's writing. But large as they were, they seemed indistinct, for the paper was blistered with the child's tears, and on the place where they had not fallen, there was a round fresh moist stain of the tear that had dropped from the lids of the father. Riccabocca renewed,—"The priest recommends a convent."
"To the devil with the priest!" cried the servant; then crossing himself rapidly, he added, "I did not mean that, Monsignore San Giacomo—forgive me! But your excellency[S] does not think of making a nun of his only child!"
"And yet why not?" said Riccabocca, mournfully; "what can I give her in the world? Is the land of the stranger a better refuge than the home of peace in her native clime?"
"In the land of the stranger beats her father's heart!"