"It is that certain woman."
"I dare say. I'm a great fool, you know."
"Don't say that. This is perhaps the only chance I shall have of seeing
you alone."
"I'm glad," he broke out in a tone that startled her. "Glad for you. I
have tried not to be a death's-head at your feast, but it has been a
struggle."
"We women see things. Martel, boy that he is, does not suspect, and yet
I, who have known you so short a time, have read your secret. It is our
happiness which makes you sad."
"No, no. I'm not that sort. I share your happiness. I want it to
continue."
"If I had one wish it would be that she might care for you as I care
for Martel. And who knows? Perhaps she may. You say it is impossible,
yet life is full of blind ways and unseen turnings. Somehow I feel that
she will."
"You are very good," he managed to say. Then yielding to a sudden
impulse, he took her hand and kissed it. A moment later she left him,
but the touch of her cool flesh against his lips remained an
unforgetable impression.
Savigno appeared, yawning prodigiously.
"Dio!" he exclaimed with a grimace. "Those cousins of hers are deadly
dull; I do not blame you for escaping. And the judge, and the notary's
wife, and that village doctor! Colonel Neri is a good chap,
notwithstanding his mustache in which he takes so much pride. He nurses
it like a child, and yet it is older than I. Poor friend of mine, you
are a martyr, thus to endure for me."
"It's tremendously interesting, particularly this part out here,"
Norvin asserted. "I saw them dancing what I took to be the tarantella a
moment ago. Those peasant boys are like leaping fauns."
"Yes, and they will continue to dance for hours yet. I fear the Donna
Teresa will not retire at her usual hour. What a day it has been! It is
fine to give people happiness. That is one of my new discoveries."
"Remember to-morrow."
"Believe me, I think of nothing else. That is why we must be going
soon. We cannot wait even for the fireworks, as much as I would like
to. It is a long road to Martinello and we must be up early in the
morning. You do not object?"
"On the contrary, I was about to bear you off in spite of yourself."
"Then I will have Ippolito fetch the horses."
"Ippolito has been demonstrating the mastery of wine over matter. He is
asleep in the manger."
"Drunk? Oh, the idiot! He has the appetite of a shark, but the belly of
a herring. I ought to warm his soles with a cane," declared Savigno,
angrily.
"Don't be too hard on him. I suspect Lucrezia would not listen to his
suit, poor chap. He's sick from unrequited passion."
"Very well, we will leave him to sleep it off. I couldn't be harsh with
him at this time. And now we had best begin presenting our good-nights,
although I hate to go."
V