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The Archbishop doesn't even turn around, for he says mass sitting down. So the Pope the Pope says it in bed with a fan! What are you thinking about?" "Of nothing more, Petra, than that he know how to weave the nito. It would be well for him to be able to sell hats and cigar-cases so that he wouldn't have to beg alms, as the curate does here every year in the name of the Pope.
They followed the others, who were now out of sight. When they reached the caves, Nito and the boys had already flung themselves down upon the sand and were sleeping.
He broke away, laughing, from Gaspare, and was swiftly in the sea. The Sicilians looked at him with admiration. "E' veramente più Siciliano di noi!" exclaimed Nito. The others murmured their assent. Gaspare glowed with pride in his pupil. "I shall make the signore one of us," he said, as he deftly let out the coils of the net. "But how long is he going to stay?" asked Nito.
To reach them they had to clamber up from the beach to the Messina road, mount a hill, and descend to the Caffè Berardi, a small, isolated shanty which stood close to the sea, and was used in summer-time by bathers who wanted refreshment. Nito and the rest walked on in front, and Delarey followed a few paces behind with Gaspare.
Gaspare cast a sly glance at Maurice, warning him to be prepared for a comedy, and Maurice at once remembered the scene on the terrace when Gaspare had described Nito's "birbante" character, and looked out for rheumatics. "Who goes into the sea, Nito?" asked Gaspare, very seriously. Nito's wrinkled and weather-beaten face assumed an expression of surprise. "Who goes into the sea!" he ejaculated.
"Haven't I, signorino?" cried Gaspare, undoubling himself, pointing to his middleman, and staring hard at Maurice. "Si, si! È vero, è vero!" cried Maurice. "I've been eating Zampaglione, and I am full. If I go into the sea to-night I shall die." "Mamma mia!" ejaculated Nito, throwing up his hands towards the stars.
Then each one in turn, with an "Alla sua salute!" to Maurice, took a drink from the great, leather bottle; and Nito, shaking out his long coil of net, declared that it was time to get to work.
One whose son is a blessed Pope can commit sins!" "Send him to my house tomorrow, Petra," cried the old man enthusiastically, "and I'll teach him to weave the nito!" "Huh! Get out! What are you dreaming about, grand-dad? Do you still think that the Popes even move their hands? The curate, being nothing more than a curate, only works in the mass when he turns around!
A wild shriek rent the air, and Gaspare, clad in a pair of bathing drawers, bounded out from behind the boat, gave Nito a cuff on the cheek, executed some steps of the tarantella, whirled round, snatched up one end of the net, and cried: "Al mare, al mare!" Nito's rheumatism was no more.
"Molto forte molto dolore?" he said. "Si, signore!" And Nito burst forth into a vehement account of his sufferings, accompanied by pantomime. "It takes me in the night, signore! Madonna, it is like rats gnawing at my legs, and nothing will stop it.
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