“I myself do not take it, but I sell it,” Fabio told him. And although this left the ethical question rather vague, it appeared to satisfy Fabio.
Mario was so indispensable, it seemed, that holidays were few and far between; when he got one, however, the occasion was momentous—it called for a gathering of the clan. A holiday was not a real holiday to Mario unless it was accompanied by toil; that was the way the good Mario took his pleasures; he planned, he worked, he wore himself out—but after it was over and he lay abed with Rosa, he could count up on his fingers all the things they had done in the course of a brief nine hours.
Mario declared that a little glimpse of green was better than a bottle of Asti; but when he found the green there was never time to see it. He sat under it, he walked on it, he lay on it perhaps, but only until he got his breath. On those very rare occasions when Mario found a meadow he would scamper over to the next. He had the sort of mind that goes with large adventure, preferring always that which lies beyond.
This mind of his, imprisoned for the best part of the year within the narrow confines of his business, broke loose the very moment it could sniff the country air; off it went and Mario with it, always seeking the beyond, always trying to go just a little farther.
Mario was eloquent regarding country air; he said that it took at least ten years off his age. But at times the spirit led him so far afield to find it, that the day would be spent in a third-class railway carriage—then it would be time to go back. He adored his children, so they too must be considered; he was never quite happy without them. He was not quite happy with them, but Mario shrugged his shoulders and supposed that that was often the way in this world.
II
It was spring, and even in Old Compton Street the spring is apt to be exciting. Nerone’s new skylark sang and jumped and sang. Nerone had made a felt top for its cage, the better to shut out the sky.
“Ma guarda! Is he not joyous?” said Nerone. “It appears that he too feels the spring.”
The skylark felt the spring, Gian-Luca felt the spring, and Mario felt the spring and grew restless. Gian-Luca looked at his motto every morning: “I have got myself,” and the words, lit up by sunshine, seemed to glow with a new and exciting meaning, until, what with youth and the spring in his bones, he almost forgot his troubles.
Mario, perspiring at the Capo di Monte, broke a dish, for which he had to pay. He grew less subtle in dealing with the clients; when he cleared their tables now he would whisk with his napkin until the crumbs flew into their laps.
“Sapristi!”—the Padrone was proud of his French—“Sapristi! You imbecile, what are you doing?”
And Mario would laugh—yes, actually laugh, right in the teeth of the Padrone!
In the mornings, when he shaved, he did so with vigor, cutting his chin in the process. The blood might drip on to the rim of his collar, but Mario did not care; he would go to the washstand and rub off the stain with an old flannel washrag—after which his collar would look limp.
“I will not have a clean one, it costs so much, the washing,” he would say. “We must save, we must put by the pennies for when we can go into the country.”
Berta got nettle-rash and cried a good deal; she got it every spring and autumn.
“Geppe has given me pidocchi!” she insisted, whenever Rosa would listen.
Geppe pretended to grope in his head and to throw the results at Berta.
“Oh! Oh!” shrieked Berta in a panic of fear. “Oh! Oh! He is throwing me pidocchi!”
Rosa scrubbed up the house, and forgetting it was London, she put the bedding out in the sun. When she brought it in it was covered with smuts.
“Accursed country!” said Nerone, and he swore: “We live in an accursed country!”
Teresa was constantly busy in the cash-desk, the money went jingling through her fingers. Whenever a sunbeam touched a golden coin she smiled and stroked it gently with her thumb. For the habit of thrift had persisted in Teresa; now she saved for the pleasure of saving. Every Saturday morning she went off to the bank with a little bag hidden in her cloak.
As for Fabio, his halo looked wilder than ever, but the pains in his back had disappeared. He served in the shop without coat, or even waistcoat, his shirt bulging out between his braces.
“God be praised,” smiled Fabio, well content with the gastronomical effects of the fine weather. “God be praised; we are selling more this spring than we have done for many years past.”
Even Rocca grew poetical, a mood which found expression in his garnishing and laying out of meat. Rocca bought a calf’s head to which he pinned rosettes, then he thrust a spring of parsley in its mouth.
The Signora Rocca said very many prayers; it was May, the month of Our Lady.
“Oh loving, oh clement, oh sweet Virgin Mary,” she murmured, and then, bethinking her of Michael the Archangel, and, via him, of Satan: “May God rebuke him—and do thou, Prince of all the heavenly host, by the power of God, thrust down into hell Satan and all wicked spirits.”
