memory of that comely young mother, poor Prudence, with her sixty years, her white hair, and wrinkled skin, was burningly jealous even now. Giovanni's name she pronounced as though it were two words--Jo Vanny; she really thought there were two. Jo she knew well, of course; it was a good New England name; Vanny was probably some senseless Italian addition. The name of the eldest son, Augusto, became on her lips Gooster; Paolo was Parlo, Assunta was Soonter.
The nuns had finally taken Soonter. The step-mother had been unable to conceal from herself her own profound relief. True, the girl
had gone to a "papish" convent; but she had always been a mystery in the house, and the constant presence of a mystery is particularly trying to the New England mind. Soonter spent hours in meditation; she was very quiet; she believed that she saw angels; her face wore often a far-away smile.
On this September evening she prepared a heavily abundant supper for Granmar, and a simple one for Nounce, who ate at any
time hardly more than a bird; Granmar, on the contrary, was gifted with an appetite of extraordinary capacities, the amount of food which was necessary to keep her, not in good-humor (she was never in good-humor), but in passable bodily tranquillity, through the twenty-four hours being equal to that which would have been required (so Prudence often thought) for three hearty New Eng-
land harvesters at home. Not that Granmar would touch New England food; none of the family would eat the home dishes which
Prudence in the earlier years had hopefully tried to prepare from such materials as seemed to her the least "onreasonable"; Granmar,
indeed, had declared each and all fit only for the hogs. Prudence never tried them now, and she had learned the art of Italian cook-
ing; for she felt that she could not afford to make anything that was to be for herself alone; the handful of precious twigs must serve for the family as a whole. But every now and then, in spite of her natural abstemiousness, she would be haunted by a vision of a "boiled dinner," the boiled corned-beef, the boiled cabbage, turnips, and potatoes, and the boiled Indian pudding of her youth. She should never taste these dainties on earth again. More than once she caught herself hoping that at least the aroma of them would be given to her some time in heaven.
When Granmar was gorged she became temporarily more tranquil. Prudence took this time to speak of a plan which she had had in her mind for several days. "Now that Gooster and the other boys are doing for themselves, Granmar, and Bepper too at last, and Jo
Vanny only needing a trifle of help now and then (he's so young yet, you know), I feel as though I might be earning more money,"
she began.
"Money's a very good thing; we've never had half enough since my sainted Annunziata joined the angels," responded Granmar, with a pious air.
"Well, it seems a good time to try and earn some more. Soonter's gone to the convent; and as it's a long while since Pipper's been here, I really begin to think he has gone off to get work somewhere, as he always said was going to."
"Don't you be too sure of Pippo," said Granmar, shaking her owl-like head ominously. "'Tany rate he hasn't been here, and I always try to hope the best about him--"
"And that's what you call the best?" interrupted Granmar, with one of her sudden flank movements, "to have him gone away off no
one knows where--Annunziata's own precious little nephew--taken by the pirates--yam! Sold as a slave--yam! Killed in the war! Oh, Pippo! poor Pippo! poor little Pipp, Pipp, Pipp!"
"And so I thought I'd try to go to the shop by the day," Prudence went on, when this yell had ceased; "they want me to come and cut out. I shouldn't go until after your breakfast, of course; and I could leave cold things out, and Nounce would cook you something
hot at noon; then I should be home myself every night in time to get your supper."
"And so that's the plan--I'm to be left alone here with an idiot while you go flouncing your heels round Assisi! Flounce, cat! It's
a wonder the dead don't rise in their graves to hear it. But we buried my Annunziata too deep for that--yam!--otherwise she'd 'a been here to tear your eyes out. An old woman left to starve alone, her own precious grandmother, growing weaker and weaker, and pining and pining. Blessed stomach, do you hear--do you hear, my holy, blessed stomach, always asking for so little, and now not even to get that? It's turned all a mumble of cold just thinking of it--yam! I, poor sufferer, who have had to stand your ugly face so long--I so fond of beauty! You haven't got but twenty-four hairs now; you know you haven't--yam! I've got more than you twenty times over--hey! that I have." And Granmar, tearing off her cap, pulled loose her coarse white hair, and grasping the ends of the
long locks with her crooked fingers, threw them aloft with a series of shrill halloos.
4
"I won't go to the shop," said Prudence. "Mercy on us, what a noise! I say I won't go to the shop. There! do you hear?"
"Will you be here every day of your life at twelve o'clock to cook me something that won't poison me?" demanded Granmar, still hallooing.
"Yes, yes, I promise you."
Even Granmar believed Prudence's yes; her yea was yea and her nay nay to all the family. "You cook me something this very minute,"
she said, sullenly, putting on her cap askew.
"Why, you've only just got through your supper!" exclaimed Prudence, astonished, used though she was to Granmar's abdominal capacities, by this sudden demand.
"You won't? Then I'll yell again," said Granmar. And yell she did.
"Hold up--do; I believe you now," said Prudence. She fanned the dying coals with a straw fan, made up the fire, and prepared some
griddle-cakes. Granmar demanded fig syrup to eat with them; and devoured six. Filled to repletion, she then suffered Prudence to
change her day cap for a nightcap, falling asleep almost before her head touched the pillow.
During this scene Nounce had sat quietly in her corner. Prudence now went to her to see if she was frightened, for the girl was
sometimes much terrified by Granmar's outcries; she stroked her soft hair. She was always looking for signs of intelligence in
Nounce, and fancying that she discovered them. Taking the girl's hand, she went with her to the next room, where were their two narrow pallet beds. "You were very smart to save the eggs for me to-day when Granmar wanted that omerlet," she whispered, as she helped her to undress.
Memory came back to Nounce; she smiled comprehendingly.
Prudence waited until she was in bed; then she kissed her good-night, and put out the candle.
Her two charges asleep, Mrs. Guadagni the second opened the back door softly and went out. It was not yet nine o'clock, a warm
dark night; though still September, the odors of autumn were already in the air, coming from the September flowers, which have a
pungency mingled with their perfume, from the rank ripeness of the vegetables, from the aroma of the ground after the first rains.
"I could have made thirty cents a week more at the shop," she said to herself, regretfully (she always translated the Italian money into American or French). "In a month that would have been a dollar and twenty cents! Well, there's no use thinking about it sence I can't go." She bent over her vegetables, feeling of their leaves, and estimating anew how many she could afford to sell, now that the family
was so much reduced in size. Then she paid a visit to her fig-trees. She had planted these trees herself, and watched over their infancy
with anxious care; at the present moment they were loaded with fruit, and it seemed as if she knew the position of each fig, so many
times had she stood under the boughs looking up at the slowly swelling bulbs. She had never before been able to sell the fruit. But now she should be able, and the sale would add a good many cents to the store of savings kept in her work-box. This work-box, a possession of her youth, was lined with vivid green paper, and