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Randal turned in surprise, and beheld a swarthy, saturnine face, with grizzled hair and marked features. He recognized the figure that had joined Riccabocca in the Italian's garden. "Speak-a-you Italian?" resumed Jackeymo. Randal, who had made himself an excellent linguist, nodded assent; and Jackeymo, rejoiced, begged him to withdraw into a more private part of the grounds.
Oh, immortal soul, for one quarter of an hour per diem de-Popkinize thine immortality! It had not been without much persuasion on the part of Jackeymo that Riccabocca had consented to settle himself in the house which Randal had recommended to him.
And Jackeymo, too, had added to our good, solid, heavy English bread preparations of wheat much lighter, and more propitious to digestion, with those crisp grissins, which seem to enjoy being eaten, they make so pleasant a noise between one's teeth. The parson esteemed it a little treat to drink tea with the Riccaboccas.
"It is very naughty of you, Miss," continued Leonard, in a milder tone, for he was both softened by the eyes and awed by the mien, "and I trust you will not do it again." "Non capisco," murmured Violante, and the dark eyes filled with tears. Jackeymo turned to Leonard with the look of an enraged tiger. "How you dare, scum of de earth that you are," cried he, "how you dare make cry the signorina?"
Things are dear in England. Will this suffice?" And Riccabocca extended a five-pound note. Jackeymo, we have seen, was more familiar with his master than we formal English permit our domestics to be with us; but in his familiarity he was usually respectful. This time, however, respect deserted him. "The padrone is mad!" he exclaimed; "he would fling away his whole fortune if I would let him.
But after he had gone through the first of these adieus with Jackeymo who, poor man, indulged in all the lively gesticulations of grief which make half the eloquence of his countrymen, and then, absolutely blubbering, hurried away Leonard himself was so affected that he could not proceed at once to the house, but stood beside the fountain, trying hard to keep back his tears.
But however close a man's character, it generally creeps out in driblets; and on many little occasions the Italian had shown acts of kindness, and, on some more rare occasions, even of generosity, which had served to silence his calumniators, and by degrees he had established a very fair reputation, suspected, it is true, of being a little inclined to the Black Art, and of a strange inclination to starve Jackeymo and himself, in other respects harmless enough.
"Take care, sir," cried Leonard; for the man, in stepping back, nearly trod upon Helen. The angler turned. "What 's the matter? Hist! you have frightened my perch. Keep still, can't you?" Helen drew herself out of the way, and Leonard remained motionless. He remembered Jackeymo, and felt a sympathy for the angler. "It is the most extraordinary perch, that!" muttered the stranger, soliloquizing.
"And with a word," said Jackeymo, resolutely, "the padrone might secure to his child all that he needs to save her from the sepulchre of a convent; and ere the autumn leaves fall, she might be sitting on his knee.
And on the arrival of Violante, he saw, with natural bitterness, that he was clean forgotten, not only by Riccabocca, but almost by Jackeymo. It was true that the master still lent him books, and the servant still gave him lectures on horticulture. But Riccabocca had no time nor inclination now to amuse himself with enlightening that tumult of conjecture which the books created.
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