The harness-maker lifted his head alertly. "Where, in America?" and we
answered for ourselves, "From New York."
Then the harness-maker rose and went to an inner doorway and called
through it something that brought out a comely, motherly woman as alert
as himself. She verified our statement for herself, and having paved the
way firmly for her next question she asked, "Do you know the Escuela
Mann?"
As well as our surprise would let us, we said that we knew the Mann
School, both where and what it was.
She waited with a sort of rapturous patience before saying, "My son, our
eldest son, was educated at the Escuela Mann, to be a teacher, and now
he is a professor in the Commercial College in Puerto Rico."
If our joint interest in this did not satisfy her expectation I for my
part can never forgive myself; certainly I tried to put as much passion
into my interest as I could, when she added that his education at the
Escuela Mann was without cost to him. By this time, in fact, I was so
proud of the Escuela Mann that I could not forbear proclaiming that a
member of my own family, no less than the father of the grandson for
whose potential donkey I was buying that headstall, was one of the
architects of the Escuela Mann building.
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