Jerry Junior | Page 4

search of the Signorina Costantina who is beautiful as the angels in Paradise, and who lives in a rose-colored villa set in a cypress grove on the shores of Lake Garda--not a bad setting for romance, is it, Gustavo?--Dinner, I believe, is at seven o'clock?"
"Si, signore, at seven; and would you like veal cooked Milanese fashion?"
"Nothing would please me more. We have only had veal Milanese fashion five times since I came."
He waved his hand jauntily and strolled whistling down the arbor that led to the lake. Gustavo looked after him and shook his head. Then he took out the two-lire piece and rang it on the table. The metal rang true. He shrugged his shoulders and turned back indoors to order the veal.
CHAPTER II
The terrace of Villa Rosa juts out into the lake, bordered on three sides by a stone parapet, and shaded above by a yellow-ochre awning. Masses of oleanders hang over the wall and drop pink petals into the blue waters below. As a study in color the terrace is perfect, but, like the court-yard of the Hotel du Lac, decidedly too hot for mid-afternoon. To the right of the terrace, however, is a shady garden set in alleys of cypress trees, and separated from the lake by a strip of beach and a low balustrade. There could be no better resting place for a warm afternoon.
It was close upon four--five minutes past to be accurate--and the usual afternoon quiet that enveloped the garden had fled before the garrulous advent of four girls. Three of them, with black eyes and blacker hair, were kneeling on the beach thumping and scrubbing a pile of linen. In spite of their chatter they were working busily, and the grass beyond the water-wall was already white with bleaching sheets, while a lace trimmed petticoat fluttered from a near-by oleander, and a row of silk stockings stretched the length of the parapet. The most undeductive observer would have guessed by this time that the pink villa, visible through the trees, contained no such modern conveniences as stationary tubs.
The fourth girl, with gray eyes and yellow-brown hair, was sitting at ease on the balustrade, fanning herself with a wide brimmed hat and dangling her feet, clad in white tennis shoes, over the edge. She wore a suit of white linen cut sailor fashion, low at the throat and with sleeves rolled to the elbows. She looked very cool and comfortable and free as she talked, with the utmost friendliness, to the three girls below. Her Italian, to an unaccustomed ear, was exactly as glib as theirs.
The washer-girls were dressed in the gayest of peasant clothes--green and scarlet petticoats, flowered kerchiefs, coral beads and flashing earrings; you would have to go far into the hills in these degenerate days before meeting their match on an Italian highway. But the girl on the wall, who was actual if not titular ruler of the domain of Villa Rosa, possessed a keen eye for effect; and--she plausibly argued--since one must have washer-women about, why not, in the name of all that is beautiful, have them in harmony with tradition and the landscape? Accordingly, she designed and purchased their costumes herself.
There drifted presently into sight from around the little promontory that hid the village, a blue and white boat with yellow lateen sails. She was propelled gondolier fashion, for the wind was a mere breath, by a picturesque youth in a suit of dark blue with white sash and flaring collar--the hand of the girl on the wall was here visible also.
[Illustration: "The fourth girl, with gray eyes and yellow-brown hair, was sitting at ease on the balustrade"]
The boat fluttering in toward shore, looked like a giant butterfly; and her name, emblazoned in gold on her prow, was, appropriately, the Farfalla. Earlier in the season, with a green hull and a dingy brown sail, she had been prosaically enough, the Maria. But since the advent of the girl all this had been changed. The Farfalla dropped her yellow wings with the air of a salute, and lighted at the foot of the water-steps under the terrace. The girl on the parapet leaned forward eagerly.
"Did you get any mail, Giuseppe?" she called.
"Si, signorina." He scrambled up the steps and presented a copy of the London Times.
She received it with a shrug. Clearly, she felt little interest in the London Times. Giuseppe took himself back to his boat and commenced fussing about its fittings, dusting the seats, plumping up the cushions, with an air of absorption which deceived nobody. The signorina watched him a moment with amused comprehension, then she called peremptorily:
"Giuseppe, you know you must spade the garden border."
Poor Giuseppe, in spite of his nautical costume, was man of all work. He glanced dismally toward the garden border which