Among the company and in keeping with the upward advance of the Longobardis was Father Di Simeone, who had performed the baptism; Dr. Rossi; the Mazzello family, who came from near Rome and always managed to refer to it proudly when among the Calabrians; several businessmen; and the well-off Colombo family with their stunning women. Chief of these was Francesca Colombo, who was called la fanatica because of the exceeding care she took of her person and her dress. She had beautiful thick hair that was turning gray and she wore it marcelled in waves. This was the one thing Umbertina envied, for her own hair was thin and wispy though still dark. Umbertina kept her color, she said, because she never washed her hair, only brushed it; by keeping the natural oils, she believed she kept the color.

“Oh, Ma,” Anna used to protest, “where do you get such ideas?”

But Umbertina knew what she knew. Her daughters would never know as much.

Now, despite being busy with greeting and feeding everyone, Umbertina had time to notice how Beppino was already acting as if he, too, owned that house. He liked to dress up and smoke cigars, and there he was talking with important people like Dr. Rossi or Father Di Simeone as if he were one of them.

“I can remember,” Father Di Simeone was saying to Beppino, shaking his head with incredulity, “when a Sunday collection at the Italian mass netted only ten or twelve dollars. No one thought the Italians would ever make enough money to build a proper church. As soon as the Irish had raised enough for that first wooden barracks where we used to say mass, they weren’t interested in financing anything else. All they wanted was for the Italians to be out of St. John’s. So what happened? We learned from the Americans. We had suppers with all the women donating the food—why Umbertina by herself sent up wagonfuls! Then lotteries, picnics, and bazaars, and we kept going until we got the church your niece was baptized in this morning.”

“That’s the church I’ll be married in, Father,” Beppino said.

“About time!” Gino Gualtiero boomed, clapping him on the shoulder. Umbertina noticed Beppino eyeing and playing up to Grazia Saccà, Domenico’s daughter, and she felt he was doing it for spite. He knew that she wanted Grazia for her Jake.

Umbertina did not hide her resentment against her brother. Serafino, more affable, would tell her, “It’s only because you can’t command him and order him about, as you do the rest of us, that you resent him. But he is your brother.”