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So for the next two or three summers Ragazzo sold ice cream in
the London streets. He would set off each afternoon, wheeling his barrow across
the great quadrangle of the Market, stopping more often than not, to give ice
creams to the Gatti daughters, Nina and Agostina, who waited for him at the
corner with Carrie Pye.
Signor Carlo's family had moved to an apartment in Hungerford
Market some years earlier and had brought Carrie as a nursemaid to their
younger children. Like Ragazzo, Carrie was growing up. She was dressed very
respectably and soberly in black, with a black hat, but nothing could repress
her auburn curls and her cheerful Irish chatter. Ragazzo loved to meet her and
talk whilst the girls sucked their ice creams. Then Carrie would walk on with
the girls down to the river and Ragazzo would turn into Hungerford Street,
making his way through the busy bus terminus and keeping a sharp lookout for
any urchins or gang of boys which pestered people there.
Sometimes they would yell at him or follow him chanting, over
and over again,
Hokey Pokey, penny a lump,
That's the stuff that
makes you jump.
He would try to take no notice, but he always felt safer
when he reached the crowded Strand and was surrounded by people and customers.
He had regular pitches along the Stand and as the summers passed some regular
competitors, for ice cream was becoming popular and other sellers brought their
barrows.
It was in the London streets that Ragazzo learnt his English,
passing the time of day chatting to the customers. He began, too, to pick up
school boy slang, for one of his pitches was by St Mary le Stand, opposite the
entrance to King's College, where everyday at 3 o'clock, the boys streamed out
from school.
Most of the boys came a long way to school and after buying an
ice would hurry off to walk or catch a bus home. A few lived close by and it
was one of these, Tom Crampton whom Ragazzo came to know. Tom would walk along
beside him, chatting about what he had done at school that day.
To Ragazzo who had never been to school and could not read or
write, young Tom seemed amazingly knowledgeable and confident. One day he
enquired exactly what it was he learned at school.
"Divinity, Latin,
Algebra, Euclid, Arithmetic ....."
Ragazzo was bewildered. "What's that?"
"Arithmetic. Why addition, subtraction, sums and such."
"Oh." That
was something that Ragazzo did know about. Counting out a dozen cakes adding up
the bill - these were things he had learnt years ago.
"Then there's
writing, masses of copying out - really boring. English, History and Geography,
French and German ... oh yes, and Drawing.
"Drawing?"
"Yes,
architectural drawing, plans and things. That's easy. My father's an architect,
you see, and I expect I'll be one too."
He went on. "But what I like most
are the Science lectures, once a week. It's really interesting. I make lots of
notes and copy them out at home. I'll show you sometime."
So over the
summer term Ragazzo got to know Tom quite well and to look forward to hearing
all about the school, about Tom's friends, about old Gog, the Headmaster and
about that silly French master, Monsieur Thibaudin, and the jokes the boys
played on him. Ragazzo felt sorry for Monsieur. He discovered too that for all
it's learning, school could be a rough place where the younger boys, like Tom,
were often bullied and knocked about or beaten.
Tom, for his part, was fascinated by Ragazzo, by his strange
life story, his hardships with the Padrone, his rescue by Signor Carlo and the
whole separate Italian-speaking world which Ragazzo lived in. Time after time
Tom came back to the same question,
"You can't remember anything at all
about your family?"
Ragazzo shook his head.
"It's all so mysterious."
Then one afternoon Tom said, "I'll try to find out about the Ticino at
school. I'll ask Mr. Swift, the Geography master and look it up on the map."
With that they parted, Tom going on to Craven Street and Ragazzo turning
into Hungerford Street. Ragazzo had scarcely said goodbye and was threading his
way through the horse buses of the terminus, when a gang of boys cornered him
between two empty buses. Two boys overturned the barrow, throwing the canister
out onto the ground, another two leapt at him.
Realising they were after his purse, Ragazzo backed away,
tripped and fell. In a moment they were on him, ripping at his shirt.
He
heard a shout from above.
"Clear off you pesky boys, or I'll whip the
living daylights out of you." One of the bus drivers had jumped down from his
bus beside Ragazzo and was laying about with his whip.
"Off with you." His
whip caught one of the boys on the back who squealed with pain. In a moment the
gang had vanished.
Dazed, Ragazzo dragged himself up. Together they set up
the barrow and canister. "You alright lad?"
"Yes signore, thank you
signore, thank you. It is most kind . . . "
"They're a right nuisance
those boys. Could have hurt you real bad."
Repeating his thanks, Ragazzo
limped shakily away. It was several days before he could take out the barrow
again
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