Heart/A Fine Visit
A FINE VISIT
This has been one of the finest Thursdays of the year for me. At two o'clock, precisely, Derossi and Coretti came to the house, with Nelli, the hunchback. Precossi's father did not let him come. Derossi and Coretti were still laughing at their encounter with Crossi, the son of the vegetable-seller, in the street,—the boy with the useless arm and the red hair,—who was carrying a large cabbage for sale. With the soldo which he was to receive for the cabbage he was to go and buy a pen. He was perfectly happy because his father had written from America that they might expect him any day.
Oh, the two delightful hours that we passed together! Derossi and Coretti are the two joiliest boys in the school; my father fell in love with them. Coretti had on his chocolate-colored jacket and his catskin cap. He is a lively imp, who always wants to be doing something, stirring up something, setting something to going. He had already carried on his shoulders half a cartload of wood, early that morning; nevertheless, he pranced all over the house, taking note of everything and talking incessantly, as sprightly and nimble as a squirrel. Going into the kitchen, he asked the cook how much we had to pay a myriagramme for wood, because his father sells it at forty-five centesimi. He is always talking of his father, of the time when he was a soldier in the 49th regiment, at the battle of Custoza, where he served in the squadron of Prince Umberto. And he is so gentle in his manners! It makes no difference that he was born and brought up surrounded by wood: he has nobility in his blood, in his heart, so my father says.
And Derossi amused us greatly. He knows geography like a teacher. He shut his eyes and said:—
“There, I see the whole of Italy; the Apennines, which extend to the Ionian Sea, the rivers flowing here and there, the white cities, the gulfs, the blue bays, the green islands;” and he repeated the names correctly in their order and very rapidly, as though he were reading them on the map. And at the sight of him standing thus, with his head held high, with all his golden curls, with his closed eyes, and all dressed in bright blue with gilt buttons, as straight and handsome as a statue, we could not help admiring him. In one hour he had learned by heart nearly three pages, which he is to recite the day after to-morrow, for the anniversary of the funeral of King Vittorio. Nelli also gazed at him in wonder and affection, smoothing the folds of his black cloth apron, and smiling with his clear and mournful eyes.
This visit gave me a great deal of pleasure; it left something like sparks in my mind and my heart. And it pleased me, too, when they went away, to see poor Nelli between the other two tall, strong fellows, who carried him home on their arms, and made him laugh as I have never seen him laugh before.
On going back to the dining-room, I noticed that the picture of Rigoletto, the hunchback jester, was no longer there. My father had taken it away in order that Nelli might not see it.