Dorothy, and Other Italian Stories

"Old cat! She is dying to turn me out; she is so dreadfully afraid that the word fever will hurt her house. All the servants are sworn to call it rheumatism."

"See here, mother, Giulio sent you this."

"I don't want any of their messes."

"But he made it himself, so it's good." He knelt down beside her sofa, holding up the cup coaxingly.

"Beef-tea," said Mrs. Roscoe, drawing down her upper lip. But she took a little to please him.

"Just a little more."

She took more.

"A little teenty more."

"You scamp! You think it's great fun to give directions, don't you?"

Maso, who had put the emptied cup back on the table, gave a leap of glee because she had taken so much.

"Don't walk on your hands," said his mother, in alarm, "It makes me too nervous."

It was the 12th of April, and she had been ill two weeks. An attack of bronchitis had prostrated her suddenly, and the bronchitis had been followed by an intermittent fever, which left her weak.

"I say, mother, let's go," said Maso. "It's so nice at the Bagni – all trees and everything. Miss Anderson'll come and pack."

Miss Anderson was one of Dr. Prior's nurses. She had taken charge of Mrs. Roscoe during the worst days of her illness.

"If we do go to the Bagni we cannot stay at the hotel," said Mrs. Roscoe, gloomily. "This year we shall have to find some cheaper place. I have been counting upon money from home that hasn't come."

"But it will come," said Maso, with confidence.

"Have you much acquaintance with Reuben John?"

The tone of voice, bitterly sarcastic, in which his mother had from his earliest remembrance pronounced this name, had made the syllables eminently disagreeable to Maso. He had no very clear idea as to the identity of Reuben John, save that he was some sort of a dreadful relative in America.

"Well, the Bagni's nice," he answered, "no matter where we stay. And I know Miss Anderson'll come and pack."

"You mustn't say a word to her about it. I have got to write a note, as it is, and ask her to wait for her money until winter. Dr. Prior, too."

"Well, they'll do it; they'll do it in a minute, and be glad to," said Maso, still confident.

"I am sure I don't know why," commented his mother, turning her head upon the pillow fretfully.

"Why, mother, they'll do it because it's you. They think everything of you; everybody does," said the boy, adoringly.

Violet Roscoe laughed. It took but little to cheer her. "If you don't brush your hair more carefully they won't think much of you," she answered, setting his collar straight.

There was a knock at the door. "Letters," said Maso, returning. He brought her a large envelope, adorned with Italian superlatives of honor and closed with a red seal. "Always so civil," murmured Mrs. Roscoe, examining the decorated address with a pleased smile. Her letters came to a Pisan bank; the bankers re-enclosed them in this elaborate way, and sent them to her by their own gilt-buttoned messenger. There was only one letter to-day. She opened it, read the first page, turned the leaf, and then in her weakness she began to sob. Maso in great distress knelt beside her; he put his arm round her neck, and laid his cheek to hers; he did everything he could think of to comfort her. Mr. Tiber, who had been lying at her feet, walked up her back and gave an affectionate lick to her hair. "Mercy! the dog, too," she said, drying her eyes. "Of course it was Reuben John," she explained, shaking up her pillow.

Maso picked up the fallen letter.

"Don't read it; burn it – horrid thing!" his mother commanded.

He obeyed, striking a match and lighting the edge of the page.

"Not only no money, but in its place a long, hateful, busybodying sermon," continued Mrs. Roscoe, indignantly.

Maso came back from the hearth, and took up the envelope. "Mrs. Thomas R. Coe," he read aloud. "Is our name really Coe, mother?"

"You know it is perfectly well."

"Everybody says Roscoe."

"I didn't get it up; all I did was to call myself Mrs. Ross Coe, which is my name, isn't it? I hate Thomas. Then these English got hold of it and made it Ross-Coe and Roscoe. I grew tired of correcting them long ago."

"Then in America I should be Thom-as Ross Coe – Thom-as R. Coe," pursued the boy, still scanning the envelope, and pronouncing the syllables slowly. He was more familiar with Italian names than with American.

"No such luck. Tommy Coe you'd be now. And as you grew older, Tom Coe – like your father before you."

They went to the Bagni – that is, to the baths of Lucca. The journey, short as it was, tired Mrs. Roscoe greatly. They took up their abode in two small rooms in an Italian house which had an unswept stairway and a constantly open door. These quarters did not depress Violet; she had no strongly marked domestic tastes; she was indifferent as to her lodging, provided her clothes were delicately fresh and pretty. But her inability to go out to dinner took away her courage. She had intended to dine at the hotel where they had stayed in former years; for two or three hours each day she could then be herself. But after one or two attempts she was obliged to give up the plan; she had not the strength to take the daily walk. It ended in food being sent in from a neighboring cook-shop, or trattoria, and served upon her bedroom table. Maso, disturbed by her illness, but by nothing else – for they had often followed a nomadic life for a while when funds were low – scoured the town. He bought cakes and fruit to tempt her appetite; he made coffee. He had no conception that these things were not proper food for a convalescent; his mother had always lived upon coffee and sweets.

On the first day of May, when they had been following this course for two weeks, they had a visitor. Dr. Prior, who had been called to the Bagni for a day, came to have a look at his former patient. He stayed fifteen minutes. When he took leave he asked Maso to show him the way to a certain house. This, however, was but a pretext, for when they reached the street he stopped.

"I dare say ye have friends here?"

"Well," answered Maso, "mother generally knows a good many of the people in the hotel when we are staying there. But this year we ain't."

"Hum! And where are your relatives?"

"I don't know as we've got any. Yes, there's one," pursued Maso, remembering Reuben John. "But he's in America."

The Scotch physician, who was by no means an amiable man, was bluntly honest. "How old are you?" he inquired.

"I'm going on fourteen."

"Never should have supposed ye to be more than eleven. As there appears to be no one else, I must speak to you. Your mother must not stay in this house a day longer; she must have a better place – better air and better food."

Maso's heart gave a great throb. "Is she – is she very ill?"

"Not yet. But she is in a bad way; she coughs. She ought to leave Italy, for a while; stay out of it for at least four months. If she doesn't care to go far, Aix-les-Bains would do. Speak to her about it. I fancy ye can arrange it – hey? American boys have their own way, I hear." This was meant as a joke; but as the grim face did not smile, the jocular intention failed to make itself apparent. The speaker nodded, and went down the street. The idea that Mrs. Roscoe might not have money enough to indulge herself with a journey to Aix-les-Bains, or to anywhere else, would never have occurred to him. He had seen her in Pisa off and on for years, one of the prettiest women there, and perhaps the most perfectly equipped as regarded what he called "furbelows"; that, with all her costly finery, she chose to stay in a high-up room at Casa Corti instead of having an apartment of her own, with the proper servants, was only another of those American eccentricities to which, after a long professional life in Italy, he was now well accustomed.

Maso went back to his mother's room with his heart in his mouth. When he came in she was asleep; her face looked wan. The boy, cold all over with the new fear, sat down quietly by the window with Mr. Tiber on his lap, and fell into anxious thought. After a while his mother woke. The greasy dinner, packed in greasy tins, came and went. When the room was quiet again he began, tremulously, "How much money have we got, mother?"

"Precious little."

"Mayn't I see how much it is?"

"No; don't bother."