Military life in Italy : sketches - Societa italiana di storia militare

DEPARTURE AND RETURN. 349
good that you have done me with your
beautiful soul and
your holy heart ? Listen I have always said it and I repeat
:
'
it, and I shall ever say, even at my last moment : No one knows
you mothers ;
but if all knew you,
if the world were interested
in the great mothers as it is in the great citizens, to a mother
like you, to an angel like you it would raise a monument.' " . .
My mother placed her hand on my mouth.
" 'A golden monument, and all those who had hearts
and souls, and I first of all, would kiss your "
footprints.'
" "
Alberto ! Alberto ! this is too much ! I will not listen !
Then both of us with tightly clasped hands, and breathing
heavily, I on my knees, she leaning over me, looked into each
other's eyes, weeping, smiling, and calling each other by
name.
. . .
" And even now I kiss your jacket ! " she exclaimed
impulsively as she embraced me and placed her lips on my
breast, and I pressed her head to my heart.
A few moments later we both took our lights, she going toward
her room, I toward mine.
When we reached the door-way we both turned, laughed, and
came back into the middle of the room.
" Alberto ! . . . who are you " '
? she asked lovingly.
" And who are you ? "
"You are
a mauvais sujefi"
" "
And you are a saint !
She looked at me, shook her head, and stood motionless in
that attitude for a moment, lighted up by the candle, her eyes
glistening with tears, with a smile so full of sweet quiet that she
really seemed a saint.
How many times, now that I am living
far from her, on re-