It was on the evening of the Thursday before Easter that I got back
to Alatri. Once more the outline of the island, that had been a soft
cloud-like shape afloat on the sea, grew distinct, and before we got
there it lay dark against an orange sunset and a flame of molten
waters. There stood the little crowd on the pier waiting the steamer's
arrival, but to-night I needed not to look for Francis among them.
During the last ten days I had had frequent news from his nurse,
always of the same sort: he suffered no more pain, but each day he was
sensibly weaker. But there among the crowd stood Pasqualino very smart
in his Bersaglieri uniform; he had come down to meet me with a similar
message. He had arrived two days before on a week's leave, and, so he
told me, spent most of the day up at the villa, helping in the house
and weeding in the garden. Sometimes when the Signorino was awake he
called to him, and they talked about all manner of things, as in the
good days before he was ill and before the accursed war came. "And
shall we all be as happy as the Signorino when we come to our last
bed?" asked Pasqualino.
There was a great change in Francis since ten days ago; he had drifted
far on the tide that was carrying him so peacefully away. He just
recognized me, said a few words, and then dozed off again into the
stupor in which he had lain all day. Through the morning of Good Friday
also, and into the afternoon he lay unconscious. But now for the
first time his sleep was troubled, and he kept stirring and muttering
to himself, unintelligibly for the most part, though now and then
there came a coherent sentence. Some inner consciousness, I think,
was aware of what day this was, for once he said, "It was I, my Lord,
who scourged Thee, and crowned Thee with the thorns of many sorrows."
During these hours the nurse and I remained at his bedside, for his
breathing was difficult, and his pulse very feeble, and it was possible
that at any moment the end might come. Pasqualino went softly about the
garden barefooted, doing his weeding, and once or twice came to look at
his Signorino. A cat dozed in the hot sunshine, the lizards scuttled
about the pillars of the pergola, and in the stone-pine a linnet sang.
But about three o'clock in the afternoon his breathing grew more quiet,
his pulse grew stronger, and he slept an untroubled sleep for another
hour. After that he awoke, and that evening and all Saturday morning
he was completely conscious and brimming over with a serene happiness.
Sometimes we talked, sometimes I read to him out of "Emma," or "Alice
in Wonderland," and during the afternoon he asked me to read him the
few verses in St John about Easter Eve.
"Do come very early to-morrow morning," he said, when this was done,
"and read the next chapter, the Easter morning chapter."