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.
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