In the middle of the afternoon they arrived at Ventimiglia and changed
trains.
“Are we in Italy now?” said Cæsar.
“Yes.”
“It seems untidier than France.”
“Yes; but more charming.”
The train kept stopping at almost all the little towns along the route.
In a third-class car somebody was playing an accordeon. It was Sunday.
In the towns they saw people in their holiday clothes, gathered in the
square and before the cafés and the eating-places. On the roads little
two-wheeled carriages passed quickly by.
It began to grow dark; in the hamlets situated on the seashore fishermen
were mending their nets. Others were hauling up the boats to run them
on to the beach, and children were playing about bare-footed and
half-naked.
The landscape looked like a theatre-scene, the setting for a romantic
play. They were getting near Genoa, running along by beaches. It was
growing dark; the sea came right up to the track; in the starry,
tranquil night only the monotonous music of the waves was to be heard.
Laura was humming Neapolitan songs. Cæsar looked at the landscape
indifferently.
On reaching Genoa they had supper and changed trains.
“I am going to lie down awhile,” said Laura.
“So am I.”
Laura took off her hat, her white cape, and her jacket.
“Good-night, _bambino_,” she said.
“Good-night. Shall I turn down the light?”
“As you like.” Cæsar turned down the light and stretched himself out.
He couldn’t sleep in trains and he got deep into a combination of
fantastical plans and ideas. When they stopped at stations and the noise
of the moving train was gone from the silence of the night, Cæsar could
hear Laura’s gentle breathing.
A little before dawn, Cæsar, tired of not sleeping, got up and started
to take a walk in the corridor. It was raining; on the horizon, below
the black, starless sky, a vague clarity began to appear. Cæsar took
out his Proudhon book and immersed himself in it.
When it began to be day they were already getting near Rome. The train
was running through a flat, treeless plain of swampy aspect, covered
with green grass; from time to time there was a poor hut, a hay-stack,
on the uninhabited, monotonous stretch.
The grey sky kept on resolving itself into a rain which, at the impulse
of gusts of wind, traced oblique lines in the air.
Laura had waked and was in the dressing-room. A little later she came
out, fresh and hearty, without the least sign of fatigue.
They began to see the yellowish walls of Rome, and certain big edifices
blackened by the wet. A moment more and the train stopped.
“It’s not worth the trouble to take a cab,” said Laura. “The hotel is
here, just a step.”
They gave a porter orders to attend to the luggage. Laura took her
brother’s arm, they went out on the Piazza Esedra, and entered the
hotel.