News From The Lane
"Hmm, hmm, indeed! An' what is 'Loo-ee-gy' anyhow? An' what is the noise
I hear save one them wore-out hurdy-gurdies, that do be roamin' the
country over, soon's ever the town gets too hot to hold 'em? Wouldn't
'pear that a nice spoken little girl as yon would be takin' up with no
Eyetalian organ-grinder," grumbled Timothy, a trifle jealously. Already
he felt a sort of proprietorship in Glory and the "Angel" and had
revolved in his mind for several nights--that is when he could keep
awake--what he could do to help her. He was as reluctant to place her in
any institution against her will as she was to have him, but he had not
known what else to propose to Mary's common sense suggestion.
Both Timothy and Mrs. Fogarty watched the open gateway, through which
Take-a-Stitch had vanished, for her to reappear, since the brick wall at
the foot of the slope fully hid the road beyond.
The music had soon ceased, but not until all the seven had swarmed out
of the house, excited over even so trifling a "show" to break the
monotony of their lives. All seven now began to exercise themselves in
the wildest antics, leaping over one another's shoulders, turning
somersaults, each fisticuffing his neighbor, and finally emitting a
series of deafening whoops as Glory actually turned back into the
grounds, her hands clinging to the arm of a swarthy little man, who
carried a hand-organ on his back and a monkey on his shoulder. The
hand-organ was of the poorest type and the monkey looked as though he
had been "upon the road" for many, many years--so ancient and wrinkled
was his visage. His jaunty red coat had faded from its original tint to
a dirty brown; and the funny little cap which he pulled from his head
was full of holes, so that it was a wonder he did not lose from it the
few cents he was able to collect in it for his master.
But the vagrant pair might have been some wonderful grandees, so proudly
did Goober Glory convey them up the slope to the very tree where Mary
and her brood awaited them, crying joyfully:
"'Tis Luigi! Luigi Salvatore, Antonio's brother! He knows me, he knows
us all and he's come straight from Elbow Lane. I mean, quite straight,
'cause he was there after I was. Wasn't you, Luigi?"
Luigi stood bareheaded now, resting his organ-pole upon the ground and
glancing from Glory's eager face to the curious faces of these others.
He understood but little of "United States language," having come to
that country but a short time before, and having hitherto relied upon
his brother Toni to interpret for him when necessary. He was waiting
permission to grind out his next tune, and not as surprised as Timothy
was that the little girl should have recognized his organ from a
multitude of others, which to the railroader sounded exactly the same.
Take-a-Stitch nodded her head, also freshly cropped like Bonny's, and he
began. For a time all went well. The seven young Fogartys were in
ecstasies, and even their elders beamed with delight, forgetting that
the one would be "docked" for his wasted time and the other that the cat
and her kittens were at that moment helping to "clear the table" she had
left standing. Even Bonny Angel gravely nodded approval from her perch
in Timothy's arms, save when the too solicitous monkey held his cap to
her. Then she frowned and buried her pretty face on Timothy's shoulder
and raised it only when Jocko had hopped another way.
But suddenly out of his selections, Luigi began that ancient tune, "A
Life on the Ocean Wave, A Home on the Rolling Deep"--and then disaster!
Almost as distinctly as if he stood there before her in the flesh,
forsaken Glory saw her grandfather's beloved form; clad in his well-kept
old uniform, buttons shining, head thrown back, gilt-trimmed cap held
easily in his wrinkled hand, with Bos'n sitting gravely upright beside
him. There he stood, in her fancy; and the vision well-nigh broke her
heart. Then down upon the grass she flung herself and all her brave
self-repression gave way before the flood of homesick longing which
besieged her.
Nobody quite understood what ailed her, though from having heard the
captain sing that melody he had just ground out, Luigi dimly guessed.
But the effect upon all was that there had been quite music enough for
the time being, and Mary showed her wisdom by drawing the company away,
counseling:
"Let her have her cry out. She's kep' in brave an' 'twill do her good.
More good'n a lickin'!" she finished, with a lunge at her eldest son,
who was fast changing his playful cuffs of a twin into blows which were
not playful; and all because between Jocko and that twin was already
developing considerable interest, which the bigger boy wished to fix
upon himself.
"Well now, ma! What for? 'Tain't every day a monkey comes a visitin'
here an' he's had him long enough. My turn next, an' that's fair,"
protested Dennis, junior, namesake of the gardener.
"No more it isn't, an' me forgettin' my manners after the fine music
he's give us. Look up, Glory, an' ask the gentleman, Looeegy yon, would
he like a bite to eat."
The girl raised her face, already ashamed of crying before other people,
and instantly eager to do something for this visitor from "home"; and
when she had repeated Mary's invitation to Luigi the smiles came back to
her own face at the smiles which lightened his.
Alas! It wasn't very much of the good dinner was left, after the cat and
her kittens had done with it, but such as remained was most welcome to
the poor Italian. Accustomed to a dry loaf of bread washed down with
water from the roadside, even the remnants of Mary Fogarty's food seemed
a feast to him; and he enjoyed it upon the door-step with Glory at his
feet and Jocko coming in for whatever portion his master thought best to
spare.
Afterward, comforted and rested, he would have repaid his hostess by
another round of his melodies; but this, much to the disgust of seven
small lads, Take-a-Stitch prevented.
Leading the organ-grinder from the threshold of the cottage to the tree
beyond it, Glory made Luigi sit down again and answer every question she
put to him; and though he did not always comprehend her words, he did
her gestures, so that, soon, she had learned all he knew of the Lane
since she had left it until the previous day when he had done so.
First, because to him it seemed of the greater importance, Luigi dwelt
upon Toni's disappointment, and divulged the great "secret" which had
matured in the peanut-merchant's brain, and was to have been made known
to Goober Glory, had she not "runned the way." The secret was a scheme
for the betterment of everybody concerned and of Antonio Salvatore in
especial; and to the effect that the blind captain and Goober Glory
should form a partnership. She was to be given charge of Antonio's own
big stand; while comfortable upon a high stool, beside it, the captain
was to sit and sing. This would have attracted many customers, Toni
thought, by its novelty; and, incidentally, the seaman might sell some
of his own frames. As for the proprietor himself, he was to have taken
and greatly enlarged the "outside business"; Luigi assisting him
whenever the organ failed to pay.
"Money, little one! Oh, mucha money for all! But you stole the baby and
runned away," ended this part of the stroller's tale, as she interpreted
it.
"I never! Never, never, never! She was sent! She belongs. Hear me!"
cried Glory, indignantly, and forthwith poured into Luigi's puzzled ear
all her own story. Then she demanded that he should answer over again
her first question when she had met him; hoping a different reply.
"Has my grandpa come back?"
But Luigi only shook his head. Even through his dim understanding, there
had filtered the knowledge that the fine old captain never would so
come. He had been killed, crushed, put out of this sunny world by a
cruel accident. So Antonio had told him; but so, in pity, for her he
would not repeat. Rather he would make light of the matter, and did so,
shrugging his shoulders in his foreign fashion and elevating his
eyebrows indifferently; then conveyed to her in his broken English that
the seaman must have "moved," because the landlord had come and sent all
the furnishings of the "littlest house" to the grocer's for safe
keeping; and there she would find them when she wished.
As for Billy Buttons and Nick, his chum, they were as bad as ever; and
Posy Jane had never a penny for his music, never; though Meg-Laundress
would sometimes toss him one if he would play for a long, long time and
so keep her children amused and out of mischief. She, too, had even gone
so far as to bid him look out all along the road he should travel for
Goober Glory herself; and if he found her and brought her back, why she
would make him a fine present. Goober Glory had been the most
inexpensive and faithful of nurses to Meg's children and she could
afford to do the handsome thing by any one who would restore her
services.
"And here I find you, already," said Luigi, accepting the wonderful fact
as if it were the simplest thing in the world, whereas, out of the many
roads by which he might have journeyed from the city, this was the one
least likely to attract his wandering footsteps. And this strange thing
was, afterward, to confirm good Meg-Laundress in her faith in "Guardian
Angels."
But when he proposed that they return at once to the Lane lest Meg's
promise should be forgotten and he defrauded of his present, Glory
firmly objected:
"No, no, Luigi. I must find grandpa. I must find this baby's folks. Then
we will go back, you and me and all of us but her; 'cause then I'll have
to give her up, I reckon--the darlin', preciousest thing!"
Luigi glanced at the sun, at the landscape, at the group of watchful
Fogartys, and reflected that there was no money to be made there. The
hand-organ belonged to Tonio, his brother, and the monkey likewise.
Tonio loved money better than anything; and Luigi, the organ, and the
monkey had been sent forth to collect it, not to loiter by the way; and
if he was not to return at once and secure Meg's present, that would
have been appropriated by Antonio, as a matter of course, he must be
about his business. When he had slowly arrived at this decision, he
rose, shouldered the hurdy-gurdy, signaled Jocko to his wrist, pulled
his cap in respect to his hostess, and set off.
"Wait, wait, Luigi! just one little minute! I must bid them good-bye,
'cause they've been so good to me, and I'm going with you! Just one
little bit or minute!" cried Glory, clasping his arm, imploringly.
The organ-grinder would be glad of her company, of any company, in fact;
so he waited unquestioningly, while Glory explained, insisted, and
finally overcame the expostulations of Timothy and Mary.
"Yes, she must go. Not until she had looked forever and ever could she
be shut up in a ''sylum' where she could look no further. When she found
him, they would come back, he and she, and show them how right she was
to keep on and how splendid he was. She thanked them--my, how she did
thank them for their kindness, and, besides, there was Bonny Angel. If
she'd dared to give up lookin' for grandpa, as he wouldn't have give up
lookin' for her, she must, she must, find the Angel's folks. She
couldn't rest--nohow, never. Think o' all them broken hearts, who'd lost
such a beau-tiful darlin' as her!"
Then she added, with many a loving look over the whole group, "But I
mustn't keep poor Luigi. He belongs to Toni, seems if, an' Toni
Salvatore can make it lively for them 'at don't please him. So,
good-bye, good-bye--everybody. Every single dear good body!"
Turning, with Bonny Angel once more in her own arms, walking backward to
have the very last glimpse possible of these new friends, with eyes fast
filling again, and stumbling over her long skirt that had lost its last
hook, Glory Beck resumed her seemingly hopeless search.
However, she was not to depart just yet nor thus. To the surprise of
all, Dennis himself now appeared in the doorway and held up his hand to
detain her. Until then, he had showed but slight interest in her, and
his strange staring at Bonny had been unnoticed by his wife. Now his
face wore a puzzled expression and he passed his hand across his eyes as
if he wished to clear his sight. He gazed with intensity upon Glory's
"Guardian" once more, and at last remarked:
"Pease in a pod. 'Tother had yellow curls. Awful trouble for them,
plenty as kids are the country over. Pease in a pod. Might try it;" and
turning sidewise he pointed toward the distant great house on the hill.
Then he retreated to his fireside again, and Mary was left to interpret.
She did so, saying:
"He's sayin' the 'family' 's in some sort o' trouble, though I hadn't
heard it. Though, 'course, they've been home only a few days an'
whatever any the other hands what's been down to see him sence has told
him he hain't told me. But I make out 't he thinks Looeegy's playin' up
there on the terrace might do noh arm an'll likely cheer 'em up a mite.
That's what I make out Dennis means. You an' the organ-man'd best make
your first stop along the road up to the big house. If they won't pay
anything to hear him play, likely they will to have him go away, bein's
they're dreadful scared of tramps an' such. Good-bye. Come an' see us
when you can!"