Down with the Pope!"
Never had he felt so enlightened, so gloriously freemasonish.
CHAPTER XXXV
The commendatore Giustino Morena--familiarly known as Don Giustino or,
by his enemies, as "the assassin"--was a Southerner by birth, a city
product. From low surroundings he had risen to be a prominent member of
the Chamber of Deputies and one of the most impressive figures in the
country.
As a child he was apprenticed to a cobbler. There, bending over his
work on the pavement outside the shop-door, his blue eyes and curly
fair hair, his rosy cheeks, his winning smile, his precocious retorts,
attracted the most favourable comment from the passers-by and secured
him an unfailing supply of chocolates and cigarettes. People liked him
so much that he quickly learned not only how to mend shoes but a good
many other things which they were anxious to teach him. His grown-up
friends vied with one another for a place in his affections and a
certain scandalous affair with knives, which somehow or other got into
the daily press where it had no business to be, put the seal on his
reputation in the quarter.
Pages:
645
646
647
648
649
650
651
652
653
654
655
656
657
658
659
660
661
662
663
664
665
666
667
668
669