The Call of the Blood - Page 191/317

"No, no. You stay here and spend the money. Bid for the clock when the

auction comes on."

"Oh, signore, but you must be here, too, then."

"All right. Come and fetch me if you like. I shall be over there under

the trees."

He waved his hand vaguely towards the lemon groves.

"Now, choose a good apron. Don't let them cheat you."

"Macchè!"

The boy laughed loudly, and turned eagerly to the stall again.

"Come, Maddalena!"

Maurice drew her quickly, anxiously, out of the crowd, and they began to

walk across the watercourse towards the farther bank and the group of

olive-trees. Salvatore had forgotten them. So had Gaspare. Both father

and servant were taken by the fascination of the fair. At last! But how

late it must be! How many hours had already fled away! Maurice scarcely

dared to look at his watch. He feared to see the time. While they walked

he said nothing to Maddalena, but when they reached the bank he took her

arm and helped her up it, and when they were at the top he drew a long

breath.

"Are you tired, signorino?"

"Tired--yes, of all those people. Come and sit down, Maddalena, under the

olive-trees."

He took her by the hand. Her hand was warm and dry, pleasant to touch, to

hold. As he felt it in his the desire to strike at Salvatore revived

within him. Salvatore was laughing at him, was triumphing over him,

triumphing in the get-all and give-nothing policy which he thought he was

pursuing with such complete success. Would it be very difficult to turn

that success into failure? Maurice wondered for a moment, then ceased to

wonder. Something in the touch of Maddalena's hand told him that, if he

chose, he could have his revenge upon Salvatore, and he was assailed by a

double temptation. Both anger and love tempted him. If he stooped to do

evil he could gratify two of the strongest desires in humanity, the

desire to conquer in love and the desire to triumph in hate. Salvatore

thought him such a fool, held him in such contempt! Something within him

was burning to-day as a cheek burns with shame, something within him that

was like the kernel of him, like the soul of his manhood, which the

fisherman was sneering at. He did not say to himself strongly that he did

not care what such men thought of him. He could not, for his nature was

both reckless and sensitive. He did care, as if he had been a Sicilian

half doubtful whether he dared to show his face in the piazza. And he had

another feeling, too, which had come to him when Salvatore had answered

his exclamation of irresistible anger at being called "compare," the

feeling that, whether he sinned against the fisherman or not, the

fisherman meant to do him harm. The sensation might be absurd, would have

seemed to him probably absurd in England. Here, in Sicily, it sprang up

and he had just to accept it, as a man accepts an instinct which guides

him, prompts him.