THE MARONIS
It was on this day, too, that Agnes received a letter from
Bloomingsburg. Kitty Robelle wrote a long and “newsy” letter, for
Kitty had been one of Agnes’ most cherished friends.
Kitty lived right next door to the house in which the Kenways had
lived so long, so she had all the news to impart of the old
neighborhood. One item interested the four Corner House girls
immensely.
“Little Tommy Rooney has run away and his mother can’t find out what’s
become of him. He swapped his Indian suit with Patsy Link for a cowboy
suit, and has been gone a week. The police, even, can’t find him.”
“There now!” cried Tess. “What did I tell you? I _knew_ I saw him go
past here in the rain.”
“Oh, but, Tess,” said Ruth, “you can’t be sure. And how could he ever
have gotten to Milton?”
“I don’t know,” said the confident Tess. “But he’s here.”
Dot agreed with her. “You know,” the latter said, gravely, “he said he
was coming to Milton to shoot Indians.”
“The foolish boy!” exclaimed Ruth. “Indians, indeed!”
“Did he expect to eat them after he shot them?” demanded Agnes. “How
would he live?”
“Perhaps he’s hungry, poor boy,” said Ruth. “I wish you girls had run
after him that day—if it was Tommy.”
“He looked awfully ragged,” said Tess, with pity. “Boys must be a
_naw_ful burden. Isn’t it lucky we haven’t any brothers to look after,
Ruth?”
“Very fortunate, I think,” agreed the oldest Kenway.
“Well,” sighed Dot, “Tommy was a real bad boy, but Mrs. Rooney thinks
just as much of him, I s’pose, as though he was a girl.”
“Not a doubt of it,” chuckled Agnes. “And if we find Tommy, we’ll send
him home to her.”
Having made a promise to Mrs. Kranz, Ruth was not the girl to neglect
its fulfillment. She was doubtful, however, whether or no she should
first see Mr. Howbridge.
The lawyer was a busy man; perhaps he would not thank her for bringing
such complaints as this of the grocery store-keeper to his attention.
Agnes said:
“He’s got troubles of his own, you may be sure, Ruth. And, honest—I
don’t see as Mrs. Kranz has any business to bring her complaints to
us.”
“But I said I’d see what I could do.”
“Of course. And I’ll go with you. I’m awfully eager to see this Joe
Maroni and his family—especially the ‘kinder like steps,’ as Mrs.
Kranz says.”
Ruth agreed to let only Aggie go with her after the younger girl had
given her word not to laugh. “It is nice to have a sense of humor, I
guess, Ag,” said the older girl, “but you want to have tact with it.
Don’t hurt people’s feelings by laughing at them.”
“I know,” sighed Agnes. “But Mrs. Kranz was so funny! To hear her say
she did not like foreigners, when she can scarcely speak English
herself.”
“You might be a foreigner yourself, Ag, as far as speaking correctly
goes,” laughed Ruth. “You’re awfully slangy. And Mrs. Kranz has lived
in this country for many, many years. She happens to be one of those
unfortunate Germans who can never master English. But I know she has a
kind heart.“
“She’s dead sore on Joe Maroni and his tribe, just the same,” declared
Agnes, proving the truth of her sister’s accusation as to her
slanginess.
The two older Kenways walked the next afternoon across town to Meadow
Street. It was in the poorer section of Milton, near the silk mills.
Although the houses were not so tall, and were mostly frame buildings,
the street reminded Ruth and Agnes of Essex Street, in Bloomingsburg,
where they had resided before coming to the old Corner House.
Mrs. Kranz had given them her number; and it was not hard to find the
three-story, brick-front building in which she kept store. Mrs. Kranz
hired the entire street floor, living in rooms at the back. There were
tenements above, with a narrow hall and stairway leading to them at
one side. The cellar was divided, half being used by Mrs. Kranz for a
store-room.
The other half was the dwelling and store of the Italian, Joe Maroni,
whose name was painted crookedly on a small sign, and under it his
goods were enumerated as
ISE COLE WOOD VGERTABLS
Joe himself was in evidence as the girls came to the place. He was a
little, active, curly haired man, in velveteen clothing and cap, gold
rings in his ears, and a fierce mustache.
“A regular brigand,” whispered Agnes, rather shrinking from his
vicinity and clinging to Ruth’s hand.
“I’m sure he’s a reformed brigand,” Ruth laughed.
The girls’ own nostrils informed them that part of Mrs. Kranz’s
complaint must be true, for there was a tall basket beside the
vegetable and fruit stand into which Joe had thrown decayed vegetable
leaves and fruit. It was a very warm day and the odor certainly was
offensive.
Joe came forward smiling, as the girls stopped at the stand. “Want-a
da orange—da pear—da banan’?” he asked, in a most agreeable way.
Agnes immediately reversed her opinion and declared he was actually
_handsome_.
“Nice-a vegetables,” said Joe, eager to display his wares. “All
fre-esh.”
Ruth took her courage in both hands and smiled at him in return. “We
haven’t come to buy anything this afternoon, Mr. Maroni,” she said.
“You see, our Uncle Peter gave us this house when he died. Our name is
Kenway. We have come to see you——”
“Si! Si!” cried the Italian, understanding them at once. “You da litla
Padrona wot own all dese,” with a wave of his hand that was both
graceful and explanatory. “Me, Joe, me hear-a ’bout de litla Padrona.
Grazias!” and he bowed and lifted his cap.
The children had appeared from the cool depths of the cellar as if by
magic. They _were_ like a flight of steps in height, and the oldest
was a very pretty girl, possibly as old as Agnes, but much smaller.
Joe turned swiftly to this one and said something in his own tongue,
nothing of which did the visitors understand save the child’s name,
“Maria.”
Maria darted down the steps again, and immediately Joe fished out a
basket from under the stand and proceeded to fill it with his very
choicest fruit.
“For you, Padrona,” he explained, bowing to Ruth again. “You mak-a me
ver’ hap’ to come see me. Grazias!”
“Oh, but Mr. Maroni!” cried Ruth, rather nervously. “You must not give
us all that nice fruit. And we did not come just to call. Some—some
of the other tenants have complained about you.”
The man looked puzzled, and then troubled. “What is that ‘complain’?”
he asked. “They no lik-a me? They no lik-a my wife? They no lik-a my
chil’ren?”
“Oh, no! nothing like that,” Ruth said, sympathetically. “They only
say you do not keep the stand clean. See! that basket of rotting
vegetables and fruit. You should get rid of it at once. Don’t the
collectors come through this part of the town for garbage?”
“Si! Si!” cried Joe, shrugging his shoulders. “But sometimes come
first my poor compatriots—si? They find da orange with da speck; dey
fin’ potato part good-a—see?” All the time he was showing them the
specked vegetables and fruit in the basket. Although his hands were
grimed, Ruth noticed that he was otherwise clean. The children, though
dirty and ragged, were really beautiful.
“W’en da poor peep’ go, then I put out-a da basket for da cart,”
pursued Joe, still smiling and still gesturing.
Up the steps at that moment came a smiling, broad Italian woman, with
a gay clean bandanna over her glossy black hair. She was a pretty
woman, too, with the same features as little Maria.
“Good-a day! good-a day!” she said, bobbing and courtesying. Then she
added something in Italian which was a friendly greeting.
Joe smiled on her dazzlingly. She wore heavier earrings than Joe and a
great gilt brooch to hold the neck of her gown together.
“She no spe’k da English mooch,” explained the man. “But da
keeds——Oh! dey learn to spe’k fine in da school. We been in dis
country six year—no? We come here fi’ year ago. We doin’ fine!”
explained Joe, with enthusiasm.
Agnes was already hugging one of the toddlers, and trying to find a
clean spot on his pretty face that she could kiss. “Aren’t they little
darlings?” she said to Ruth.
The older girl agreed with her, but she was having difficulty herself
in forming the request she wished to make to the Italian. Finally she
said:
“Joe, you must let the city men take away your spoiled fruit every
morning. You can pick it over yourself and save what you think your
poor friends would like. Although, it is very bad to eat decayed fruit
and vegetables. Bad for the health, you know.”
“Si! Si!” exclaimed Joe, smiling right along. “I understand. It shall
be as da litla Padrona command. Eh?”
“And let me go down into the cellar, Joe. For your own sake—for your
children’s health, you know—you must keep everything clean.”
The woman spoke quickly and with energy. Joe nodded a great deal. “Si!
Si!” he said. “So the good-a doctor say wot come to see da bébé.”
“Oh! have you a baby?” cried Agnes, clasping her hands.
The woman smiled at the eager girl and offered her hand to lead Agnes
down the broken steps. Ruth followed them. The cellar was damp because
of the ice blocks covered with a horseblanket at one side. Beyond the
first partition, in a darker room, there was an old bedstead with ugly
looking comforters and pillows without cases. Right down in one corner
was an old wooden cradle with the prettiest little black haired baby
in the world sleeping in it! At least, so Agnes declared.
Mrs. Maroni was delighted with the girls’ evident admiration for the
baby. She could tell them by signs and broken words, too, that the
baby was now better and the doctor had told her to take it out into
the air and sunshine all day. She could trust some of the older
children with it; Maria was big enough to help at the stand. _She_ had
the housework to do.
The Italian woman led the way to her other apartment—if such it could
be called. The rear cellar had two little, high windows looking into a
dim little yard. They had no right to the yard. That belonged to the
tenants above, and Ruth could see very well that the yard would be the
better for a thorough cleaning-up.
“Perhaps Mr. Howbridge will say we have no right to interfere,”
thought the oldest of the Corner House girls. “But I’m just going to
tell him what I think of this place.”
The cellar was not so dirty, only it was _messy_. The Italians’
possessions were of the cheapest quality, and they had scarcely a
decent chair to sit on. Whether it was poverty or a lack of knowledge
of better things, Ruth could not decide.
The little Maria came close to her side and smiled at her. “You speak
English all right, don’t you?” asked Ruth.
“Oh, yes, Ma’am. I go to school,” said Maria.
“Do you know the lady who has the store up stairs?”
The little girl’s face clouded. “Yes, Ma’am. I guess she’s a nice
German lady, but she is _so_ cross.”
“I do not think she’d be cross with you if she saw you in a clean
dress and with your face and hands washed,” said Ruth, with a sudden
idea. “If you will make yourself tidy, I will take you up stairs with
me, and we can call on Mrs. Kranz.”
The child’s face brightened in a flash. She said something to her
mother, who replied in kind. Maria ran behind a curtain that hung in
one corner, and just then Joe came down.
“You want-a me to feex up, Padrona?” he asked. “I no ask nottin’ since
w’en I come here. De walls much dirt’—eh?”
“If they were whitewashed I think it would be ever so nice and clean,”
declared Ruth. “I shall speak to Mr. Howbridge and see if I can get
him to supply the whitewash. Will you put it on?”
“But surely—si! si!” exclaimed the man. “I lik-a have nice place. I
keep good-a fruit—good-a vegetable. Da wife, she clean an’
scr-r-rub—oh, yes! But poor man live in da cellar not lik-a da reech
dat live in da fine house.”
Ruth sighed. With such little experience as she had had, she knew the
man’s words to be true. The Kenways had lived among poor people
themselves and knew how hard it was to keep an old tumble-down
tenement in nice order.
Maria came dancing out in what was evidently her gala frock. It was
pretty and neatly made, too. She ran to the sink and washed her face
and hands. Then she came to Ruth for her approval.
“You’re a pretty girl,” said Ruth, kissing her. “You can help a lot,
too, by keeping your brothers and sisters clean.”
“Oh, yes, Ma’am! I make them wash up every day before they go to
school. But there is no school now,” said Maria.
The visitors went out of the cellar with Maria. The other children
eyed them curiously, but smilingly. Poverty set well upon these
Italians, for they smiled at it!
“Now we shall go in and see Mrs. Kranz,” said Ruth to Agnes. “Goodness
only knows what she will say to us. Come, Maria,” and she took the
little girl’s hand.