Page:The story of Mary MacLane (IA storyofmarymacla00macliala).pdf/319

 Was he awfully nice, and did he say awfully sweet things to you?"

"He was dem sweet—oh, yes," said the peddler-woman. She grinned. "And I was young."

"And you liked it when you were young and he was sweet, didn't you?"

"Yes, I guess so. I was young," she answered.

The fact that one is young seems to imply—in the Italian peddler mind—a lacking in some essential points.

"And don't you like your man now?" I asked.

"Dat-a man, he's all right, in Italy—he is," replied the woman.

"Well," I observed, "if I had a man who had been dem sweet once, when I had been young, but who was not sweet any more, I think I should leave him in Italy, too."

"You'll git a man some day soon," said the peddler-woman.

I was interested to know that.

"They all do—oh, yes," she said.