Aunt Jane's Nieces Abroad
The weather was somewhat rough for the latter part of March--they had
sailed the twenty-seventh--but the "Irene" was so staunch and rode the
waves so gracefully that none of the party except Louise was at all
affected by the motion. The eldest cousin, however, claimed to be
indisposed for the first few days out, and so Beth and Patsy and Uncle
John sat in a row in their steamer chairs, with the rugs tucked up to
their waists, and kept themselves and everyone around them merry and
light hearted.
Next to Patsy reclined a dark complexioned man of about thirty-five,
with a long, thin face and intensely black, grave eyes. He was
carelessly dressed and wore a flannel shirt, but there was an odd look
of mingled refinement and barbarity about him that arrested the girl's
attention. He sat very quietly in his chair, reserved both in speech and
in manner; but when she forced him to talk he spoke impetuously and with
almost savage emphasis, in a broken dialect that amused her immensely.
"You can't be American," she said.
"I am Sicilian," was the proud answer.
"That's what I thought; Sicilian or Italian or Spanish; but I'm glad
it's Sicilian, which is the same as Italian. I can't speak your lingo
myself," she continued, "although I am studying it hard; but you manage
the English pretty well, so we shall get along famously together."
He did not answer for a moment, but searched her unconscious face with
his keen eyes. Then he demanded, brusquely:
"Where do you go?"
"Why, to Europe," she replied, as if surprised.
"Europe? Pah! It is no answer at all," he responded, angrily. "Europe is
big. To what part do you journey?"
Patsy hesitated. The magic word "Europe" had seemed to sum up their
destination very effectively, and she had heretofore accepted it as
sufficient, for the time being, at least. Uncle John had bought an
armful of guide books and Baedeckers, but in the hurry of departure she
had never glanced inside them. To go to Europe had been enough to
satisfy her so far, but perhaps she should have more definite knowledge
concerning their trip.
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There was once an honest journeyman tailor, by name Labakan, who learned his trade with an excellent master in Alexandria. It could not be said that Labakan was unhandy with the needle; on the contrary, he could make excellent work: moreover, one would have done him injustice to have called him lazy. Nevertheless, his companions knew not what to make of him, for he would often sew for hours together so rapidly that the needle would glow in his hand, and the thread smoke, and that none could equal him.
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