Page:De Amicis - Heart, translation Hapgood, 1922.djvu/53

 And turning to the cart for another armful, “according to the mode in which the action is enunciated”.

It was our grammar lesson for the following day. “Isn't this a good scheme?” he said. “I am putting my time to use. My father has gone off on business. My mother is ill. It falls to me to do the unloading. In the meantime, I am going over my grammar lesson. It is a hard lesson to-day; I cannot succeed in getting it into my head.—My father said that he would be here at seven o'clock to give you your money,” he said to the man with the cart.

The cart drove off. “Come into the shop a minute,” Coretti said to me. I went in. It was a large room, full of piles of wood and fagots, with a steel-yard on one side.

“This is a busy day, I can assure you,” resumed Coretti; “I have to do my work by fits and starts. I was writing my phrases, when some customers came in. I went to writing again, and behold! that cart arrived. I have already made two trips to the wood market in the Piazza Venezia this morning. My legs are so tired that I can hardly stand, and my hands are all swollen. I should be in a pretty pickle if I had to draw!” And as he spoke he set about sweeping up the dry leaves and the straw which covered the brick-paved floor.

“But where do you do your work, Coretti?” I inquired.

“Not here, certainly,” he replied. “Come and see;” and he led me into a little room behind the shop, which served as a kitchen and dining-room, with a table in one corner, on which there were books and copy-books,