Alas, the uncertain glory of an English June. That night the weather
changed. Monday was grey and cold, the beginning of a cold grey week,
a week of rain and wind, of low skies and scudding clouds; the
sad-coloured sea flecked with angry white, the earth sodden; leaves,
torn from their trees, scurrying down the pathways; and Adrian, of all
persons, given over to peevishness and lamentations.
"Oh, I brazenly confess it--I 'm a fair-weather friend," he said, as he
looked disconsolately forth from the window of his business-room, (a
room, by the bye, whereof the chief article of furniture was a
piano-à-queue). "Bring me sunshine and peaches, and I 'll be as sweet
as bright Apollo's lute strung with his hair. But this sort of gashly,
growsy, grim, sour, shuddery weather turns me into a broken-hearted
vixen. I could sit down and cry. I could lie down and die. I could
rise up and snap your head off. I am filled with verjuice and vitriol.
Oh, me! Oh, my!"
He stamped backwards and forwards, in nervous exasperation. He went to
the piano, and brought his hands down in a discordant clang upon the
keys.
"Can't anybody silence those stupid _birds_?" he cried, moving back to
the window, through which the merry piping of a robin was audible.
"How inept, how spiteful, of them to go on singing, singing, in the
face of such odious weather. Tell Wickersmith or someone to take a gun
and an umbrella, and to go out and shoot them. And the wind--the
strumpet wind," he cried. "All last night it gurgled and howled and
hooted in my chimney like a drunken banshee, and nearly frightened me
to death. And me a musician. And me the gentlest of God's
creatures--who never did any harm, but killed the mice in father's
barn. I ask you, as a man of the world, is it delicate, is it fair?
Drip, drip, drip--swish, swish, swash,--ugh, the rain! If it could
_guess_ how I despise it!" He made a face and shook his fist at it.
"Do you think the weather _knows_ how disagreeable it is? We all know
how disagreeable other people can be, but so few of us know how
disagreeable we ourselves can be. Do you think the weather knows? Do
you think it's behaving in this way purposely to vex me?"
But for Anthony it was a period not without compensations. He saw
Susanna nearly every day. On Tuesday she and Miss Sandus were his
guests at dinner; on Wednesday he and Adrian were her guests at
luncheon; on Thursday, at tea-time, they paid their visit of digestion;
on Friday, the rain holding up for a few hours in the afternoon, he and
Susanna went for a walk on the cliffs.
The sea-wind buffetted their faces, it lifted Susanna's hair and blew
stray locks about her temples, it summoned a lively colour to her
cheeks. Anthony could admire the resolute lines, the forceful action,
of her strong young body, as she braced herself to march against it.
From the turf under their feet rose the keen odour of wet earth, and
the mingled scents of clover and wild thyme. All round them
sand-martins wheeled and swerved, in a flight that was like aerial
skating. Far below, and beyond the dark-green of Rowland Marshes,
which followed the winding of the cliffs like a shadow, stretched the
grey sea, with its legions of white horses.
"What a sense one gets, from here, of the sea's immensity," Susanna
said. "I think the horizon is a million miles away."
"It is," affirmed Anthony, with conclusiveness, as one possessing exact
knowledge. Then, in a minute, "And, as we are speaking in round
numbers, are you aware that it's a million years since I last had the
pleasure of a word with you?"
Susanna's dark eyes grew big.
"A million years? Is it really," she doubted, in astonishment.
"Really and truly," asseverated he.
"A million years! How strange," she murmured, as one in a maze.
"Truth is often strange," said he.
"Yes--but this is particularly strange," she pointed out. "Because,
first, we have only known each other a week. And, secondly, I was
under the impression that you had had 'a word with me' yesterday--and
again the day before yesterday--and again the day before that."
"I beg your pardon," said he. "I have not had a word with you since we
sat by the brink of your artificial streamlet last Saturday afternoon;
and that, speaking in round numbers, was a million years ago. As for
yesterday, and the day before yesterday, and the day before that,--I
don't count it having a word with you when we are surrounded by
strangers."
"Strangers--?" wondered Susanna.
"Yes," said he. "That fellow Willes, and your enchanting friend Miss
Sandus."
Susanna gave one of her light trills of laughter.
"We can't discuss our private affairs before them," said Anthony; "and
I 've been pining to discuss our private affairs."
"Have we private affairs?" Susanna questioned, in surprise.
"Of course we have," said he. "Everybody has. And it is to discuss
them that I have inveigled you into taking this walk with me. Does n't
the sort of English weather you 're at present getting a taste of make
you wish you had never left Italy?"
"Oh," she acquainted him, "it sometimes rains in Italy."
"Does it, indeed?" he enquired, opening his eyes. "But never--surely
never--at Sampaolo?"
"Yes, even sometimes at Sampaolo," she laughed. "And mercy, how the
wind can blow there! This is nothing to it. I don't think you have
any winds in England so violent as our _temporali_."
Anthony nodded, with satisfaction.
"Please go on," he urged. "I have been longing to hear more about
Sampaolo."
"Oh?" said Susanna, looking sceptical. "I feared I had wearied you
inexcusably with Sampaolo."
"Every syllable you pronounced," vowed he, "was of palpitating
interest, and you broke off at the most palpitating moment. You were
on the point of telling me how, from an Island of the Blessed, Sampaolo
came to be an Island of the Distressed--when we were interrupted by a
skylark."
"That would be a terribly long story," Susanna premonished him, shaking
her head.
"I adore terribly long stories," he declared. "And have we not before
us the whole of future time?"
"Sampaolo came to be an Island of the Distressed," said she, "because,
some half-century ago, the Sampaolesi got infected with an idea that
was then a kind of epidemic--the idea of Italian unity. So they had a
revolution, overthrew their legitimate sovereign, gave up their
Independence, and united themselves to the 'unholy and unhappy State'
which has since assumed the name of the Kingdom of Italy."
"That is not a terribly long story," Anthony complained. "I 'm afraid
you are suppressing some of the details."
"Yes," she at once acknowledged, "I daresay I 'm suppressing a good
many of the details."
"That's not ingenuous," said he, "nor--nor kind."
"It was not unkindly meant," said she.
"But Sampaolo," he questioned, "had, then, been independent? Go on.
Be communicative, be copious; tell me all about it."
"For more than seven hundred years," answered Susanna, "Sampaolo had
been independent. The Counts of Sampaolo were counts regnant, holding
the island by feudal tenure from the Pope, who was their suzerain, and
to whom they paid a tribute. They were counts regnant and lords
paramount, _tiranni_, as they were called in mediaeval Italy; they had
their own coinage, their own flag, their own little army; and though
some of the noble Sampaolese families bore the title of prince or duke
at Rome, they ranked only as barons at Sampaolo, and were subjects of
the Count."
A certain enthusiasm rang in her voice. They walked on for some paces
in silence.
"In the Palazzo Rosso at Vallanza, to this day," she continued, "you
will be shown the throne-room, with the great scarlet throne, and the
gilded coronet topping the canopy above it. But the Counts of Sampaolo
were good men and wise rulers; and, under them, for more than seven
hundred years, the island was free, prosperous, and happy. And though
many times the Turks tried to take it, and many times the Venetians,
and though sometimes the Pope tried to take it back, when the Pope
happened to be a difficult Pope, the Sampaolesi, who were splendid
fighters, always managed to hold their own."
Again they took some paces in silence.
"Then"--her voice had modulated--"then the idea of Italian unity was
preached to them, and in 1850 they had a revolution; and foolish,
foolish Sampaolo voluntarily submitted itself to the reign of Victor
Emmanuel. And ever since,"--her eyes darkened,--"what with the
impossible taxes, the military conscription, the corrupt officials, the
Camorra, Sampaolo has been in a very wretched plight indeed.
But--_pazienza_!" She gave her shoulders a light little shrug. "The
Kingdom of Italy will not last forever."
"We will devoutly hope not," concurred Anthony. "Meanwhile, I am glad
to note that in politics you are a true-blue reactionary."
"In Sampaolese politics," said she, "reaction would be progress.
Before 1850 the people of Sampaolo were prosperous, now they are
miserably poor; were pious, now they are horribly irreligious; were
governed by honest gentlemen, now they form part of a nation that is
governed by its criminal classes."
"And what became of the honest gentlemen?" Anthony enquired. "What did
the counts do, after they were--'hurled,' I believe, is the consecrated
expression--after they were hurled from their scarlet thrones?"
"Ah," said Susanna, seriously, "there you bring me to the chapter of
the story that is shameful."
"Oh--?" said he, looking up.
"The revolution at Sampaolo was headed by the Count's near kinsman,"
she said. "The present legitimate Count of Sampaolo is an exile. His
title and properties are held by a cousin, who has no more right to
them, no more shadow of a right, of a moral right, than--than I have."
"Ah," said Anthony. And then, philosophically, "A very pretty
miniature of an historical situation," he commented. "Orleans and
Bourbon, Hanover and Stuart. A count in possession, and a count over
the water, an usurper and a pretender."
"Exactly," she assented, "save that the Count in possession happens to
be a Countess--the grand-daughter of the original usurper, whose male
line is extinct. Oh, the history of Sampaolo has been highly coloured.
A writer in some English magazine once described it as a patchwork of
melodrama and opera-bouffe. It ended, if you like, in melodrama and
opera-bouffe, but it began in pure romance and chivalry."
"Don't stop," said Anthony. "Tell me about the beginning."
"I can tell you that," announced Susanna, smiling, "in the words of
your own English historian, Alban Butler."
She paused for an instant, as if to make sure of her memory, and then,
smiling, recited--
"'In the year 1102 or 1103,' he says, in his Life of St. Guy Valdescus
of The Thorn, as he Anglicises San Guido Valdeschi della Spina, 'when
the Saint was returning from the Holy Land, where he had been a
crusader, he was shipwrecked, by the Providence of God, upon the island
of Ilaria, in the Adriatic Sea; and he was greatly afflicted by the
discovery that the inhabitants of that country were almost totally
ignorant of the truths of our Holy Religion, while the little knowledge
they possessed was confused with many diabolical superstitions. They
still invoked the daemons of pagan mythology, and sacrilegiously
included our Divine Lord and His Blessed Mother in the number of these.
Now, St. Guy had distinguished himself in the Crusade alike for his
valour in action, for the edifying character of his conversation, and
for the devotion and recollection with which he performed the exercises
of religion; and he was surnamed Guy of the Thorn for that he had
caused to be fixed in the hilt of his sword a sharp thorn, or spine,
which, when he fought, should prick the flesh of his hand, and thus
keep him in mind of the pious purpose for which he was fighting, and
that it behoved a soldier of the Cross to fight, not in private anger
or martial pride, but in Christian zeal and humility. When, therefore,
after his shipwreck, and after many other perils and adventures by sea
and land, the Saint finally arrived at Rome, of which city his family
were patricians, and where his venerable mother, as well as his wife
and children, eagerly awaited his return, he was received with every
sign of favour by the Pope, Pascal the Second, who commended him warmly
upon the good reports he had had of him, and asked him to choose his
own reward. St. Guy answered that for his reward he prayed he might be
sent back to the island of Ilaria, with a bishop and a sufficient
company of priests, there to spread the pure light of the Faith among
the unfortunate natives. Whereupon the Pope created him Count and
Governor of the country, the heathen name of which he changed to St.
Paul, and gave him as the emblem of his authority a sword in the hilt
of which was fixed a thorn of gold. This holy relic, under the name of
the Spina d'Oro, is preserved, for the reverence of the faithful. In
the cathedral of the city of Vallanza, where the descendants of St. Guy
still reign as lieutenants of the Sovereign Pontiff.'--There,"
concluded Susanna, with a little laugh, "that is the Reverend Alban
Butler's account of the matter."
"I stand dumb with admiration," professed Anthony, his upcast hand
speaking volumes, "before your powers of memory. Fancy being able to
quote Alban Butler word for word, like that!"
"When I was young," Susanna explained, "I was made by my English
governess to learn many of Butler's Lives by heart, and, as an Ilarian,
the Life of San Guido interested me particularly. He was canonised, by
the way, by Adrian the Fourth--the English Pope. As a consequence of
that, the Valdeschi have always had a great fondness for England, and
have often married English wives--English Catholics, of course. An
Englishwoman was Countess of Sampaolo when the end came, the patchwork
end."
"Ah, yes," said Anthony, "the patchwork end--tell me about that."
"The end," Susanna answered, "was an act of shameful treachery on the
part of one of the descendants of San Guido towards another, his
immediate kinsman, and the rightful head of the family. And now it is
melodrama and opera-bouffe as much as ever you will. It is a
revolution in a tea-cup. It is the ancient story of the Wicked Uncle."
"Yes?" said Anthony.
"It is perfectly trite," said Susanna, "and it would be perfectly
absurd, if it were n't rather tragic, or perfectly tragic, if it were
n't rather absurd."
She thought for a moment. Anthony waited, attentive.
"In 1850," she narrated, "Count Antonio the Seventeenth died, leaving a
widow, who was English, and an only son, a lad of twelve, who should
naturally have succeeded his father as Guido the Eleventh. But Count
Antonio had a younger brother, also named Guido, who coveted the
succession for himself, and had long been intriguing to secure
it--organising secret societies among the people, to further the idea
of Italian unity, and bargaining with the King of Sardinia for the
price he should receive if he contrived to bring the Sampaolesi to give
up their independence. Well," she went on, with a slight effect of
effort, "while his brother lay dying, Guido, spying his opportunity,
was especially active. 'Now,' he said to the people, 'is the time to
strike. If, at my brother's death, his son succeeds him, we shall have
a regency, and the regent will be a foreigner and a woman. Now is the
time to terminate this petty despotism forever, to repudiate the
suzerainty of the Pope, and to join in the great movement of Italia
Riunita. To the Palace! Let us seize the Englishwoman and her son,
and banish them from the island. Let us hoist the tricolour, and
proclaim ourselves Italians, and subjects of the King. To the Palace!'
So, while that poor lady"--her voice quavered a little--"while that
poor lady was kneeling at the bedside of her dead husband,"--her voice
sank,--"a great mob of insurgents broke into the Palazzo Rosso, singing
'Fuori l'Italia lo straniero,' seized her and the little Count, dragged
them to the sea-front, and put them aboard a ship that was leaving for
Trieste."
She paused for a few seconds.
"Then there was a plebiscite," she proceeded, "and Sampaolo solemnly
transformed itself into a province of the Kingdom of Sardinia."
She paused again.
"And the Wicked Uncle," she again proceeded, "received his price from
Turin. First, he was appointed Prefect of Sampaolo for life.
Secondly, the little Count and his mother were summoned to take the
oath of fidelity to the King, and as they did not turn up to do so,
having gone to her people in England, they were declared to have
outlawed themselves, and to be 'civilly dead', their properties,
accordingly, passing to the next heir, who, of course, was Guido
himself. Thirdly, Guido was created Count of Sampaolo by royal patent,
the Papal dignity being pronounced 'null and not recognisable in the
territories of the King.' It is Guido's granddaughter who is Countess
of Sampaolo to-day."
She terminated her narration with a motion of the hand, as if she were
tossing something from her. Anthony waited a little before he spoke.
"And the little Count?" he said, at length.
"The little Count," said Susanna, "went through the formality of suing
his uncle for the recovery of his estates--or, rather, his mother, as
his guardian, did so for him. But as the action had to be tried in the
law-courts at Turin, I need n't tell you how it ended. In fact, it was
never tried at all. For at the outset the judges decided that the
suitor would have no standing before them until he had taken the oath
of allegiance to the King, and renounced his allegiance to the Pope.
He was 'civilly dead'--he must civilly resuscitate himself. As he
refused to do this, his cause was dismissed, unheard."
"And then--?" said Anthony.
"Then the little Count returned to England, and grew to be a big count,
and married an Englishwoman, and had a son, and died. He was adopted
by his mother's brother, an English country gentleman, who, surviving
him, and being a bachelor, adopted his son in turn. The son, however,
dropped his title of Count, a title more than seven hundred years old,
and assumed the name of his benevolent great-uncle. I 'm not sure,"
she reflected, "that I quite approve of his dropping that magnificent
old title."
"Oh, he very likely found it an encumbrance, living in England, as an
Englishman--especially if he was n't very rich," said Anthony. "He
very likely felt that it rendered him rather uncomfortably conspicuous.
Besides, a man does n't actually _drop_ a title--he merely puts it in
his pocket--he can always take it out again. You don't, I suppose," he
asked, with a skilfully-wrought semblance of indifference, "happen to
remember the name that he assumed?"
"Of course, I happen to remember it," replied Susanna. "As you must
perceive, the history of Sampaolo is a matter I have studied somewhat
profoundly. How could I forget so salient a fact as that? The name
that he assumed," she said, her air elaborately detached, "was Craford."
But Anthony evinced not the slightest sign of a sensation.
"Craford?" he repeated. "Ah, indeed? That is a good name, a good old
south-country Saxon name."
"Yes," agreed Susanna; "but it is not so good as Antonio Francesco
Guido Maria Valdeschi della Spina, Conte di Sampaolo."
"It is not so long, at any rate," said he.
"Nor so full of colour," supplemented she.
"As I hinted before, a name like a herald's tabard might be something
of an inconvenience in work-a-day England," he returned. Then he
smiled, rather sorrily. "So you 've known all there was to be known
from the beginning, and my laborious dissimulation has been useless?"
"Not useless," she consoled him, her eyes mirthfully meeting his. "It
has amused me hugely."
"You've--if you don't mind the expression--you've jolly well taken me
in," he owned, with a laconic laugh.
"Yes," laughed she, her chin in the air.
And for a few minutes they walked on without speaking.
The wind buffetted their faces, it wafted stray locks of hair about
Susanna's temples, it smelt of the sea and the rain-clouds, though it
could not blow away the nearer, friendlier smell of the wet earth, nor
the sweetness of the clover and wild thyme. All round them,
sand-martins performed their circling, swooping evolutions. In great
squares fenced by hurdles, flocks of sheep nibbled the wet grass. Far
beneath, the waters stretched grey to the blurred horizon, where they
and the low grey sky seemed one.
But I think our young man and woman were oblivious of things external,
absorbed in their private meditations and emotions. They walked on
without speaking, till a turn in the cliff-line brought them in sight
of the little town of Blye, at the cliffs' base, where it rose from the
surrounding green of Rowland Marshes like a smoky red island.
"Blye," said Anthony, glancing down.
"Yes," said Susanna. "I had no idea we had come so far."
"I 'm afraid we have come _too_ far. I 'm afraid I have allowed you to
tire yourself," said he, with anxiety.
"Tired!" she protested. "Could one ever get tired walking in such
exhilarating air as this?"
And, indeed, her colour, her bright eyes, her animated carriage, put to
scorn his apprehension.
"But we must turn back, all the same," she added, "or--we shall not be
home for tea."
She spoke in bated accents, and made a grave face, as if to miss tea
were to miss a function sacrosanct.
Anthony laughed, and they turned back.
"It's a bit of a coincidence," he remarked presently, "that, coming
from Sampaolo, you should just have chanced to take a house at Craford."
"Nothing could be simpler," said Susanna. "I wished to pass the summer
in England, and was looking for a country house. The agent in London
mentioned Craford New Manor, among a number of others, and Miss Sandus
and I came down to see it. The prospect of finding myself the tenant
of my exiled sovereign rather appealed to me--appealed to my sense of
romance and to my sense of humour. And then,"--her eyes
brightened,--"when we met your perfectly irresistible Mr. Willes,
hesitation was impossible. He kept breaking out with little snatches
of song, while he was showing us over the place; and afterwards he
invited us to his music-room, (or I think he called it his
_business_-room), and sang properly to us--his own compositions. He
even permitted me to play some of his accompaniments."
Anthony chuckled.
"I 'm sure he did--I see my Adrian," he said. "Well, I owe him more
than he 's aware of."
"Your Excellency is the legitimate Count of Sampaolo," said Susanna.
"Antonio, by the Grace of God, and the favour of the Holy See, Count of
Sampaolo--thirty-fourth count, and eighteenth of the name. I am your
very loyal subject. Let's conspire together for your restoration."
"You told me the other day that you were a subject of the Pope,"
Anthony objected.
"That is during this interregnum," she explained. "The Pope is our
liege lord's liege lord, and, in our liege lord's absence, our homage
reverts to him. I will never, at all events, admit myself to be a
subject of the Duke of Savoy. Let's plot for your restoration."
"My 'restoration,' if that is n't too sounding a term, is a thing past
praying for," said Anthony. "But I don't know that I should very
keenly desire it, even if it were n't."
"What!" cried she. "Would n't it be fun to potentate it on a scarlet
throne?"
"Not such good fun, I fancy, as it is to squire it in these green
meadows," he responded. "Are n't scarlet thrones apt to be upholstered
with worries and responsibilities?"
"Are n't green meadows sown thick with worries and responsibilities?"
asked Susanna.
"Very likely," he consented. "But for a moderate stipend I can always
hire a man like Willes to reap and deal with them for me."
"Could n't you hire 'a man like Willis' to extract them from your
scarlet cushions? Potentates have grand viziers. Mr. Willes would
make a delicious grand vizier," she reflected, with a kind of
wistfulness.
"He would indeed," said Anthony. "And we should have comic opera again
with interest."
"But you only look at it from a selfish point of view," said Susanna.
"Think of poor Sampaolo--under the old régime, an Island of the
Blessed."
"Seriously, is there at Sampaolo, the faintest sentiment in favour of a
return to the old régime?" he asked.
"Seriously, and more 's the pity, not the faintest," Susanna confessed.
"I believe I am the only legitimist in the island--save a few priests
and nuns, and they don't count. I am the entire legitimist party."
She turned towards him, making a little bow.
"Yet there is every manner of discontent with the present régime," she
said. "The taxes, the conscription, the difficulties put in the way of
commerce, the monstrous number of officials, and the corruption of them
one and all, are felt and hated by everyone. Under the old régime, for
example," she illustrated, "Vallanza was a free port,--now we have to
pay both a national duty and a municipal duty on exports as well as
imports; nothing was taxed but land, and that very lightly--now nearly
everything is taxed, even salt, even a working-man's tools, even a
peasant's necessary donkey, so that out of every lira earned the
government takes from forty to sixty centimes; the fisheries of
Sampaolo, which are very valuable, were reserved for the
Sampaolesi,--now they are open to all Italy, and Sampaolo, an island,
cannot compete with Ancona, on the railway. In Sampaolo to-day, if you
have any public business to transact, from taking out a dog license to
seeking justice in the law-courts, every official you have to deal
with, including the judges, expects his buonamano. If you post a
letter, it is an even chance whether the Post-Office young men won't
destroy the letter and steal the stamps; while, if you go to the
Post-Office to buy stamps, it is highly possible that they will
playfully sell you forged ones."
She gave a bitter little laugh.
"The present Prefect of Sampaolo," she continued her illustrations,
"formerly kept a disreputable public house, a sailors' tavern, at
Ancona. He is known to be a Camorrista; and though his salary is only
a few thousand lire, he lives with the ostentation of a parvenu
millionaire, and no one doubts where he gets his money. These evils
are felt by everyone. But the worst evil of all is the condition of
the Church. In the old days the Sampaolesi were noted for their piety;
now, even in modern irreligious Italy, you would seek far to unearth a
people so flagrantly irreligious. From high to low the men are
atheists; and the few men who are not, have to be very careful how they
show it. It is as much as a tradesman's trade is worth, as much as an
employe's place is worth, to go to Mass; the one will sit behind a
deserted counter, the other will learn that his services are no longer
needed. The present régime is liked by no one save the officials who
benefit by it; but it tickles the vanity of the Sampaolesi to call
themselves citizens of a Great Power; and so, though many are
republicans, many socialists, none are legitimists. They would prefer
any burden to the burden of insignificance; and under the reign of the
Valdeschi, though free, prosperous, and happy, Sampaolo was
insignificant."
"You paint a very sad state of things," said Anthony.
"Believe me," said Susanna, "my painting is pale beside the reality."
"And, apparently, a hopeless state," he added.
"Some day the Kingdom of Italy must end in a tremendous smash-up.
Afterwards, perhaps, there will be a readjustment. Our hope is in
that," said she.
"Meanwhile, you make it clear, I am afraid," he argued, "that we should
gain only our labour for our pains in plotting a restoration."
"We should have the excitement of plotting," laughingly argued she.
"A plotter's best reward, like an artist's, you suggest, is the
pleasure he takes in his work. But now you are inciting me to look at
it again from the selfish point of view, for which a moment ago you
were upbraiding me," he reminded her.
"_Do_ look at it from the selfish point of view," inconsistent and
unashamed, she urged. "Think of your lands, your houses, your palaces
and gardens, Castel San Guido, Isola Nobile, think of your pictures,
your jewels, the thousand precious heirlooms that are rightly yours,
think of your mere crude money. How can you bear the thought that
these are in the possession of a stranger--these, your inheritance, the
inheritance of nearly eight hundred years? Oh, if I were in your
place, the wrong of it would fill the universe for me. I could not
endure it."
"One has no choice but to endure it," said he. "One benumbs resentment
with a fatalistic 'needs must.'"
"One would do better to inflame resentment with a defiant 'where there
's a will there 's a way,'" Susanna answered.
"The way is not plain to see."
"No--but we must discover the way. That"--she smiled--"shall be the
aim of our plotting."
And again for some time they walked on without speaking.
"If she could only guess how little my heart's desire is centred upon
the lands and houses of Sampaolo," thought Anthony, "how entirely it is
centred upon something much nearer home. I wonder what she would do if
I should tell her."
And at that thought his heart winced with delight and terror.
He looked sidewise at her. Her dark hair curled about her temples, and
drooped in a loose mass behind; her dark eyes shone; there was a warm
colour in her cheeks. Her head held high, her body defined itself in
lines of strength and beauty, as she walked by the cliff's edge,
resisting the wind, with the sea and the sky for background. He looked
at her, and wondered what would happen if he should tell her; and his
heart glowed with delight, and winced with delight and terror,--glowed
with delight in the supreme reality of her presence, winced with
delight and terror at the imagination of telling her.
And then the suspended rain came down in a sudden pelting shower; and
Anthony put up his umbrella. To keep in its shelter, they had to walk
very close to each other, their arms touching sometimes. I daresay
they were both pretty wet when they reached Craford New Manor, but I
don't think either minded much.
Miss Sandus, who met them in the hall, insisted that Susanna must go
upstairs and change; but to Anthony she said, "There 'll be tea in a
minute or two," and led the way to the drawing-room, the big, oblong,
sombre red-and-gold drawing-room, with its heavy furniture, its heavy
red damask hangings, its heavy gilded woodwork, its heavy bronzes and
paintings.
Wet as he was, he followed, and sat down, with his conductress, before
the huge red-marble fireplace, in which a fire of logs was blazing--by
no means unwelcome on this not-uncharacteristic English summer's day.