"Oh, shut up, can't you!" said the widow, embarrassed and irritated. "Give me all your hands, I want to shake them all; for I know you are both just as good as you can be."
It was a victorious thought, a master-stroke of diplomacy, though that never occurred to her and she cared nothing for diplomacy. She shook the four hands in turn cordially, and went back to her place in a state of high and fine exultation that made her look young and handsome.
"Indeed I owe everything to Luigi," said Angelo, affectionately. "But for him I could not have survived our boyhood days, when we were friendless and poor--ah, so poor! We lived from hand to mouth-lived on the coarse fare of unwilling charity, and for weeks and weeks together not a morsel of food passed my lips, for its character revolted me and I could not eat it. But for Luigi I should have died. He ate for us both."
"How noble!" sighed Rowena.
"Do you hear that?" said the widow, severely, to her boys. "Let it be an example to you--I mean you, Joe."
Joe gave his head a barely perceptible disparaging toss and said: "Et for both. It ain't anything I'd 'a' done it."
"Hush, if you haven't got any better manners than that. You don't see the point at all. It wasn't good food."
"I don't care--it was food, and I'd 'a' et it if it was rotten."
"Shame! Such language! Can't you understand? They were starving-- actually starving--and he ate for both, and--"
"Shucks! you gimme a chance and I'll--"
"There, now--close your head! and don't you open it again till you're asked."
[Angelo goes on and tells how his parents the Count and Countess had to fly from Florence for political reasons, and died poor in Berlin bereft of their great property by confiscation; and how he and Luigi had to travel with a freak-show during two years and suffer semi-starvation.]
"That hateful black-bread; but I seldom ate anything during that time; that was poor Luigi's affair--"
"I'll never Mister him again!" cried the widow, with strong emotion, "he's Luigi to me, from this out!"
"Thank you a thousand times, madam, a thousand times! though in truth I don't deserve it."
"Ah, Luigi is always the fortunate one when honors are showering," said Angelo, plaintively; "now what have I done, Mrs. Cooper, that you leave me out? Come, you must strain a point in my favor."
"Call you Angelo? Why, certainly I will; what are you thinking of! In the case of twins, why--"
"But, ma, you're breaking up the story--do let him go on."
"You keep still, Rowena Cooper, and he can go on all the better, I reckon. One interruption don't hurt, it's two that makes the trouble."
"But you've added one, now, and that is three."
"Rowena! I will not allow you to talk back at me when you have got nothing rational to say."
CHAPTER III
ANGELO IS BLUE
[After breakfast the whole village crowded in, and there was a grand reception in honor of the twins; and at the close of it the gifted "freak" captured everybody's admiration by sitting down at the piano and knocking out a classic four-handed piece in great style. Then the judge took it--or them--driving in his buggy and showed off his village.]
All along the streets the people crowded the windows and stared at the amazing twins. Troops of small boys flocked after the buggy, excited and yelling. At first the dogs showed no interest. They thought they merely saw three men in a buggy--a matter of no consequence; but when they found out the facts of the case, they altered their opinion pretty radically, and joined the boys, expressing their minds as they came. Other dogs got interested; indeed, all the dogs. It was a spirited sight to see them come leaping fences, tearing around corners, swarming out of every bystreet and alley. The noise they made was something beyond belief-- or praise. They did not seem to be moved by malice but only by prejudice, the common human prejudice against lack of conformity. If the twins turned their heads, they broke and fled in every direction, but stopped at a safe distance and faced about; and then formed and came on again as soon as the strangers showed them their back.