THE ALIENS


Pietro Tobigili, that gay young chestnut vender--he of the radiant
smiles--gave forth, in his warm tenor, his own interpretation of "Ach
du lieber Augustine," whenever Bertha, rosy waitress in the little
German restaurant, showed her face at the door. For a month it had
been a courtship; and the merchant sang often:

_"Ahaha, du libra Ogostine,
Ogostine, Ogostine!
Ahaha, du libra Ogostine,
Nees coma ross."_

The acquaintance, begun by the song and Pietro's wonderful laugh, had
grown tender. The chestnut vender had a way with him; he looked like
the "Neapolitan Fisher Lad" of the chromos, and you could have fancied
him of two centuries ago, putting a rose in his hair; even as it was,
he had the ear-rings. But the smile of him it was that won Bertha,
when she came to work in the little restaurant. It was a smile that
put the world at its ease; it proclaimed the coming of morning over
the meadows, and, taking every bystander into an April friendship, ran
on suddenly into a laugh that was like silver, and like a strange
puppy's claiming you for the lost master.

So it befell that Bertha was fascinated; that, blushing, she laughed
back to him, and was nothing offended when, at his first sight of her,