Page 37 - nostromo-a-tale-of-the-seaboard

Inglesi’—the engineers (he was a famous cook, though the
kitchen was a dark place)—he was, as it were, under the eye
of the great man who had led him in a glorious struggle
where, under the walls of Gaeta, tyranny would have ex-
pired for ever had it not been for that accursed Piedmontese
race of kings and ministers. When sometimes a frying-pan
caught fire during a delicate operation with some shred-
ded onions, and the old man was seen backing out of the
doorway, swearing and coughing violently in an acrid cloud
of smoke, the name of Cavour—the arch intriguer sold to
kings and tyrants—could be heard involved in impreca-
tions against the China girls, cooking in general, and the
brute of a country where he was reduced to live for the love
of liberty that traitor had strangled.
Then Signora Teresa, all in black, issuing from anoth-
er door, advanced, portly and anxious, inclining her fine,
black-browed head, opening her arms, and crying in a
profound tone—
‘Giorgio! thou passionate man! Misericordia Divina! In
the sun like this! He will make himself ill.’
At her feet the hens made off in all directions, with im-
mense strides; if there were any engineers from up the line
staying in Sulaco, a young English face or two would appear
at the billiard-room occupying one end of the house; but
at the other end, in the cafe, Luis, the mulatto, took good
care not to show himself. The Indian girls, with hair like
flowing black manes, and dressed only in a shift and short
petticoat, stared dully from under the square-cut fringes on
their foreheads; the noisy frizzling of fat had stopped, the

Nostromo: A Tale of the Seaboard