Artois did not go with them. Once again he was governed by an imperious
feeling that held him inactive, the feeling that it was not for him to
approach Hermione--that others might draw near to her, but that he dared
not. The sensation distressed and almost humiliated him, it came upon
him like a punishment for sin, and as a man accepts a punishment which
he is conscious of deserving Artois accepted it.
So now he waited alone on the crest of the island, looking towards the
Casa del Mare.
What would be the result of this strange and daring embassy?
He was not long to be in doubt.
“Signore! Signore!”
Gaspare’s voice was calling him from somewhere in the darkness.
“Signore.”
“I am coming.”
There had been a thrill of emotion in the appeal sent out to him. He
hurried towards the house. He crossed the bridge. When he was on it he
heard the splash of oars below him in the Pool, but he took no heed of
it. What were the fishermen to him to-night? Before the house door he
met Gaspare and Ruffo.
“What is it?”
“The Signora is not in her room, Signore.”
“Not--? How do you know? Is the door open?”
“Si, Signore. The Signora has gone! And the _fattura della morte_ has
gone.”
“The _fattura della morte_ has gone!” repeated Ruffo.
The repetition of the words struck a chill to the heart of Artois. Again
he was beset by superstition. He caught it from these children of the
South, who stared at him now with their grave and cloudy eyes.
“Perhaps one of the servants--” he began.
“No, Signore. I have asked them. And they would not dare to touch it.”
“The Signorina?”
He shook his head.
“She is in the garden. She has been there all the time. She does not
know”--he lowered his voice almost to a whisper--“she does not know
about the Signora and the _fattura della morte_.”
“We must not let her know--”
He stopped. Suddenly his ears seemed full of the sound of splashing oars
in water. Yet he heard nothing.
“Gaspare,” he said quickly, “have you looked everywhere for the
Signora?”
“I have looked in the house, Signore. I have been on the terrace and
to the Signorina in the garden. Then I came to tell you. I thought you
should know about the Signora and the _fattura della morte_.”
Artois felt that it was this fact of the disappearance of the
death-charm which for the moment paralyzed Gaspare’s activities. What
stirring of ancient superstition was in the Sicilian’s heart he did not
know, but he knew that now his own time of action was come. No longer
could he delegate to others the necessary deed. And with this knowledge
his nature seemed to change. An ardor that was almost vehement with
youth, and that was hard-fibred with manly strength and resolution, woke
up in him.
Again his ears were full of the sound of oars in water.
“Ruffo,” he said, “will you obey me?”
He laid his hand on the boy’s shoulder.
“Si, Signore.”
“Go into the garden. Stay with the Signorina till I come.”
“Si, Signore.”
“If it is a long time, if the Signorina is afraid, if she wants to do
anything, you are to say that Don Emilio said she was not to be afraid,
and that she was to wait.”
“Si, Signore.”
The boy paused, looking steadily at Artois, then, seeing that he had
finished, turned away and went softly into the house.
“Gaspare, come with me.”
Gaspare said nothing, but followed him down to the foot of the cliff.
One of the island boats was gone. When Gaspare saw that he ran to pull
in the other. He held out his arm to help Artois into the boat, then
took the oars, standing up and looking before him into the night.
“Row towards the village, Gaspare.”
“Si, Signore.”
At that moment Gaspare understood much of what was in Artois’s mind. He
relied upon Artois. He trusted him--and this fact, of Gaspare’s trust
and reliance upon him, added now to that feeling of ardor that had
risen up in Artois, gave him courage, helped to banish completely that
punishing sensation which had condemned him to keep away from Hermione
as one unworthy to approach her, to touch even the hem of her grief.
No need to tell Gaspare to row quickly. With all his strength he forced
the boat along through the calm sea.
“Keep near the shore, Gaspare!”
“Si, Signore.”
Only the first quarter of the young moon was visible in the sky. It
cast but a thin and distant glint of silver upon the waters. By the near
shore the dimness of this hour was unbroken by any light, unstirred by
any sound except the withdrawn and surreptitious murmur of the sea. The
humped shapes of the low yellow rocks showed themselves faintly like
shapes of beasts asleep. In the distance, lifted above the sea, two or
three flames shone faintly. They were shed by lamps or candles set in
the windows of the fishermen’s cottages in the village.
Had Hermione gone to the village?
She might have left the island with some definite purpose, or moved by a
blind impulse to get away, and be alone. Artois could not tell. But she
had taken the _fattura della morte_.
He wondered whether she knew its meaning, with what sinister intention
it had been made. Something in the little worthless thing must have
attracted her, have fascinated her, or she would not have taken it.
In her distress of mind, in her desire for solitude, she would have
hastened away and left it lying where it was.
Perhaps she had a purpose in leaving the island with the _fattura della
morte_.
Her taking of it began to seem to Artois, as it had evidently seemed to
Gaspare, a fact of profound significance. His imagination, working with
an almost diseased rapidity and excitement, brought before him a series
of scenes in which the death-charm figured as symbol. In one of these
there were two women--Hermione and Maddalena.
Hermione might have set out on some wild quest to Mergellina. He
remembered the face at the window, and knew that to-night everything was
possible.
“Row quickly, Gaspare!”
Gaspare bent almost furiously to the oars. Then sharply he turned his
head.
“What is it?”
“I can see the boat! I can see the Signora!”
The words struggled out on a long breath that made his broad chest
heave. Instinctively Artois put his hands on the gunwale of the boat on
either side of him, moving as if to stand up.
“Take care, Signore!”
“I’d forgotten--” He leaned forward, searching the night. “Where is the
Signora?”
“There--in front! She is rowing to the village. No, she has turned.”
He stopped rowing.
“The Signora has seen, or she has heard, and she is going in to shore.”
“But there are only the rocks.”
“The Signora is going in to the Palazzo of the Spirits.”
“The Palazzo of the Spirits?” Artois repeated.
“Si, Signore.”
Gaspare turned and looked again into the darkness.
“I cannot see the Signora any more.”
“Follow the Signora, Gaspare. If she has gone to the Palazzo of the
Spirits row in there.”
“Si, Signore.”
He drew the oars again strongly through the water.
Artois remembered a blinding storm that had crashed over a mountain
village in Sicily long ago, a flash of lightning which had revealed to
him the gaunt portal of a palace that seemed abandoned, a strip of black
cloth, the words “_Lutto in famiglia_.” They had seemed to him prophetic
words.
And now--?
In the darkness he saw another darkness, the strange and broken outline
of the ruined palace by the sea, once perhaps, the summer home of some
wealthy Roman, now a mere shell visited in the lonely hours by the
insatiate waves. Were Hermione and he to meet here? To-day he had
thought of his friend as a spirit that had been long in prison. Now he
came to the Palace of the Spirits to face her truth with his. The Palace
of the Spirits! The name suggested the very nakedness of truth. Well,
let it be so, let the truth stand there naked. Again, mingling with a
certain awe, there rose up in him a strong ardor, a courage that was
vehement, that longed at last to act. And it seemed to him suddenly that
for many years, through all the years that divided Hermione and him from
the Sicilian life, they had been held in leash, waiting for the moment
of this encounter. Now the leash slackened. They were being freed. And
for what?
Gaspare plunged his right oar into the sea alone. The boat swung round
obediently, heading for the shore.
One of the faint lights that gleamed in the village was extinguished.
“Signore, the Signora has left the boat!”
“Si?”
“Madonna! She has let it go! She has left it to the sea!”
He backed water. A moment later the little boat in which Vere loved to
go out alone grated against theirs.
“Madonna! To leave the boat like that!” exclaimed Gaspare, bending to
catch the tow-rope. “The Signora is not safe to-night. The Signora’s
saint will not look on her to-night.”
“Put me ashore, Gaspare.”
“Si, Signore.”
The boat passed before the façade of the palace.
Artois knew the palace well by day. This was the first time he had come
to it by night. In daylight it was a small and picturesque ruin washed
by the laughing sea, lonely but scarcely sad. Leaping from its dark and
crumbling walls the fisher-boys often plunged into the depths below;
or they lay upon the broad sills of the gaping window-spaces to dry
themselves in the sun. Men came with rods and lines to fish from its
deserted apartments, through which, when rough weather was at hand, the
screaming sea-birds flew. The waves played frivolously enough in its
recesses. And their voices were heard against the slimy and defiant
stones calling to teach other merrily, as perhaps once the voices
of revellers long dead called in the happy hours of a vanished
villeggiatura.
But the night wrought on it, in it, and about it change. Its solitude
then became desolation, the darkness of its stones a blackness that
was tragic, its ruin more than a suggestion, the decisive picture of
despair.
At its base was a line of half-discovered window-spaces, the lower parts
of which had become long since the prey of the waves. Above it were
more window-spaces, fully visible, and flanking a high doorway, once, no
doubt, connected with a staircase, but now giving upon mid-air. Formerly
there had been another floor, but this had fallen into decay and
disappeared, with the exception of one small and narrow chamber situated
immediately over the doorway. Isolated, for there was no means of
approach to it, this chamber had something of the aspect of a low and
sombre tower sluggishly lifting itself towards the sky. The palace was
set upon rock and flanked by rocks. Round about it grass grew to the
base of a high cliff at perhaps two hundred yards distance from it. And
here and there grass and tufts of rank herbage pushed in its crevices,
proclaiming the triumph of time to exulting winds and waters.
As Gaspare rowed in cautiously and gently to this deserted place, to
which from the land no road, no footpath led, he stared at the darkness
of the palace with superstitious awe, then at the small, familiar boat,
which followed in their wake because he held the tow-rope.
“Signore,” he said, “I am afraid!”
“You--Gaspare!”
“I am afraid for the Signora. Why should she come here all alone with
the _fattura della morte_? I am afraid for the Signora.”
The boat touched the edge of the rock to the right of the palace.
“And where has the Signora gone, Signore? I cannot see her, and I cannot
hear her.”
He lifted up his hand. They listened. But they heard only the sucking
murmur of the sea against the rocks perforated with little holes, and in
distant, abandoned chambers of the palace.
“Where has the Signora gone?” Gaspare repeated, in a whisper.
“I will find the Signora,” said Artois.
He got up. Gaspare held his arm to assist him to the shore.
“Thank you.”
He was on the rocks.
“Gaspare,” he said, “wait here. Lie off the shore close by till I come
back.”
“Si, Signore.”
Artois hesitated, looking at Gaspare.
“I will persuade the Signora to come back with us,” he said.
“Si, Signore. You must persuade the poor Signora. The poor Signora is
mad to-night. She gave me a look--” His eyes clouded with moisture. “If
the poor Signora had not been mad she could not have looked at me like
that--at another, perhaps, but not at me.”
It seemed as if at last his long reserve was breaking down. He put up
his hand to his eyes.
“I did not think that my Padrona--”
He stopped. Artois remembered the face at the window. He grasped
Gaspare’s hand.
“The Signora does not understand,” he said. “I will make the Signora
understand.”
“Si, Signore, you must make the poor Signora understand.”
Gaspare’s hand held on to the hand of Artois, and in that clasp the
immense reserve, that for so many years had divided, and united, these
two men, seemed to melt like gold in a crucible of fire.
“I will make the Signora understand.”
“And I will wait, Signore.”
He pushed the boat off from the rocks. It floated away, with its
sister boat, on the calm sea that kissed the palace walls. He gave his
Padrona’s fate into the hands of Artois. It was a tribute which had upon
Artois a startling effect.
It was like a great resignation which conferred a great responsibility.
Always Gaspare had been very jealous, very proud of his position of
authority as the confidential servant and protector of Hermione.
And now, suddenly, and very simply, he seemed to acknowledge his
helplessness with Hermione--to rely implicitly upon the power of Artois.
Vere, too, in her way had performed a kindred action. She had summoned
“Monsieur Emile” in her great trouble. She had put herself in his hands.
And he--he had striven to delegate to others the burden he was meant to
bear. He had sent Vere to Hermione. He had sent Gaspare to her. He
had even sent Ruffo to her. Now he must go himself. Vere, Gaspare,
Ruffo--they were all looking to him. But Gaspare’s eyes were most
expressive, held more of demand for him than the eyes of the girl and
boy. For the past was gathered in Gaspare, spoke to him in Gaspare’s
voice, looked at him from Gaspare’s eyes, and in Gaspare’s soul waited
surely to know how it would be redeemed.
He turned from the sea and looked towards the cliff. Now he had the
palace on his left hand. On his right, not far off, was a high bluff
going almost sheer into the sea. Nevertheless, access to the village
was possible by the strip of rocks beneath it. Had Hermione gone to the
village by the rocks? If she had, Gaspare’s keen eyes would surely have
seen her. Artois looked at the blank wall of the palace. This extended
a little way, then turned at right angles. Just beyond the angle, in its
shadow, there was a low and narrow doorway. Artois moved along the wall,
reached this doorway, stood without it, and listened.
The grass here grew right up to the stones of the ruin. He had come
almost without noise. Before him he saw blackness, the blackness of a
passage extending from the orifice of the doorway to an interior chamber
of the palace. He heard the peculiar sound of moving water that is beset
and covered in by barriers of stone, a hollow and pugnacious murmur, as
of something so determined that it would be capable of striving through
eternity, yet of something that was wistful and even sad.
For an instant he yielded his spirit to this sound of eternal striving.
Then he said:
“Hermione!”
No one answered.
“Hermione!”
He raised his voice. He almost called the name.
Still there was no answer. Yet the silence seemed to tell him that she
was near.
He did not call again. He waited a moment, then he stepped into the
passage.
The room to which it led was the central room, or hall, of the palace--a
vaulted chamber, high and narrow, opening to the sea at one end by the
great doorway already mentioned, to the land beneath the cliff by a
smaller doorway at the other. The faint light from without, penetrating
through these facing doorways, showed to Artois a sort of lesser
darkness, towards which he walked slowly, feeling his way along the
wall. When he reached the hall he again stood still, trying to get
accustomed to the strange and eerie obscurity, to pierce it with his
eyes.
Now to his left, evidently within the building, and not far from where
he stood, he heard almost loudly the striving of the sea. He heard the
entering wave push through some narrow opening, search round the walls
for egress, lift itself in a vain effort to emerge, fall back baffled,
retreat, murmuring discontent, only to be succeeded by another eager
wave. And this startling living noise of water filled him with a
sensation of acute anxiety, almost of active fear.
“Hermione!” he said once more.
It seemed to him that the voice of the water drowned his voice, that
it was growing louder, was filling the palace with an uproar that was
angry.
“Hermione! Hermione!”
He strove to dominate that uproar.
Now, far off, through the seaward opening, he saw a streak of silver
lying like a thread upon the darkness of the sea. And as he saw it, the
voice of the waves within the palace seemed to sink suddenly away almost
to silence. He did not know why, but the vision of that very distant
radiance of the young and already setting moon seemed to restore to him
abruptly the accuracy of his sense of hearing.
He again went forward a few steps, descending in the chamber towards the
doorway by the worn remains of an almost effaced staircase. Reaching the
bottom he stood still once more. On either side of him he could faintly
discern openings leading into other rooms. Perhaps Hermione, hearing him
call, had retreated from him through one of them. A sort of horror
of the situation came upon him, as he began thoroughly to realize the
hatred, hatred of brain, of nerves, of heart, that was surely quivering
in Hermione in this moment, that was driving her away into the darkness
from sound and touch of life. Like a wounded animal she was creeping
away from it and hating it. He remembered Gaspare’s words about the look
she had cast upon perhaps the most truly faithful of all her friends.
But--she did not know. And he, Artois, must tell her. He must make her
see the exact truth of the years. He must win her back to reason.
Reason! As the word went through his mind it chilled him, like the
passing of a thing coated with ice. He had been surely a reasonable
man, and his reasonableness had led him to this hour. Suddenly he saw
himself, as he had seen that palace door by lightning. He saw himself
for an instant lit by a glare of fire. He looked, he stared upon
himself.
And he shivered, as if he had drawn close to, as if he had stood by, a
thing coated with ice.
And he dared to come here, to pursue such a woman as Hermione! He dared
to think that he could have any power over her, that his ice could have
any power over her fire! He dared to think that! For a moment all, and
far more than all, his former feelings of unworthiness, of helplessness,
of cowardice, rushed back upon him. Then, abruptly, there came upon
him this thought--“Vere believes I have power over Hermione.” And then
followed the thought--“Gaspare believes that I have power over her.” And
the ice seemed to crack. He saw fissures in it. He saw it melting.
He saw the “thing” it had covered appearing, being gradually revealed
as--man.
“Vere believes in my power. Gaspare believes in my power. They are the
nearest to Hermione. They know her best. Their instincts about her
must be the strongest, the truest. Why do they believe in it? Why do
they--why do they know--for they must, they do know, that I have this
power, that I am the one to succeed where any one else would fail? Why
have they left Hermione in my hands to-night?”
The ice was gone. The lightning flash lit up a man warm with the breath
of life. From the gaunt door of the abandoned palace the strip of black
cloth, the tragic words above it, dropped down and disappeared.
Suddenly Artois knew why Vere believed in his power, and why Gaspare
believed in it--knew how their instincts had guided them, knew to what
secret knowledge--perhaps not even consciously now their knowledge--they
had travelled. And he remembered the words he had written in the book at
Frisio’s on the night of the storm:
“La Conscience, c’est la quantite de science innee que nous avons en
nous.”
He had written those words hurriedly, irritably, merely because he had
to write something, and they chanced--he knew not why--to come into his
mind as he took hold of the pen. And it was on that night, surely, that
his conscience--his innate knowledge--began to betray him. Or--no--it
was on that night that he began to defy it, to deny it, to endeavor to
cast it out.
For surely he must have known, he had known, what Vere and Gaspare
innately knew. Surely his conscience had not slept while theirs had been
awake.
He did not know. It seemed to him as if he had not time to decide this
now. Very rapidly his mind had worked, rushing surely through corridors
of knowledge to gain an inner room. He had only stood at the foot of
the crumbling staircase two or three minutes before he moved again
decisively, called again, decisively:
“Hermione! Hermione! I know you are here. I have come for you!”
He went to the right. On the left was the chamber which had been taken
possession of by the sea. She could not have gone that way, unless--he
thought of the _fattura della morte_, and for a moment the superstitious
horror returned upon him. But he banished it. That could not be. His
heart was flooded by conviction that cruelty has an end, that the most
relentless fate fails at last in its pursuing, that the _fattura della
morte_, if it brought death with it, brought a death that was not of the
body, brought, perhaps, a beautiful death of something that had lived
too long.
He banished fear, and he entered the chamber on the right. It was lit
only by an opening looking to the sea. As he came into it he saw a tall
thing--like a tall shadow--pass close to him and disappear. He saw that,
and he heard the faint sound of material in movement.
There was then still another chamber on this side, and Hermione had
passed into it. He followed her in silence, came to the doorway of it,
looked, saw black darkness. There was no other opening either to sea or
land. In it Hermione had found what she sought--absolute blackness.
But he had found her. Here she could not escape him.
He stood in the doorway. He remembered Vere’s trust in him. He
remembered Gaspare’s trust. He remembered that Gaspare was waiting in
the boat for him--for them. He remembered the words of Gaspare:
“You must make the poor Signora understand!”
That was what he had to do: to make Hermione understand. And that surely
he could do. Surely he had the power to do it now.
For he himself understood.