"Stoop down, Filippo.

I want to tell you something in your ear." Moved by curiosity rather than humanity, the padrone stooped over, and Giacomo whispered: "When you go back to Italy, dear Filippo, go and tell my mother how I died.

Tell her not to let my father sell my little brother to a padrone, or he may die far away, as I am dying.

Promise me, Filippo." There was no answer.

The padrone did indeed feel a slight emotion of pity, but it was, unhappily, transient.