"He is going to sleep, and there are no end of things I want to
know. Angiolino!"
"Sissignora," murmured the boy.
"Tell me about Signor Graziano."
"He is our padrone; he is never here."
"But he is coming to-day. Wake up, Angiolino. I tell you he is on the
way!"
"Between life and death there are so many combinations," drawled the
boy, with Tuscan incredulity and sententiousness.
"Ah!" cried the girl, with a little shiver of impatience. "Is he young?"
"Che!"
"Is he old, then?"
"Neppure!"
"What is he like? He must be _something_."
"He's our padrone," repeated Angiolino, in whose imagination Signor
Graziano could occupy no other place.
"How stupid you are!" exclaimed the young English girl.
"May be," said Angiolino stolidly.
"Is he a good padrone? do you like him?"
"Rather!" The boy smiled, and raised himself on one elbow; his eyes
twinkled with good-humored malice.
"My Babbo has much better wine than _quel signore_," he said.
"But that is wrong!" cried Goneril, quite shocked.
"Who knows?"
After this, conversation flagged. Goneril tried to imagine what a great
musician could be like: long hair, of course; her imagination did not
get much beyond the hair. He would, of course, be much older now than
his portrait. Then she watched Angiolino cutting the corn, and learned
how to tie the swathes together.
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