The Call of the Blood - Page 222/317

And he had not slept. How he wished that he could sleep for a little

while and forget everything. In sleep one knows nothing. He longed to be

able to sleep.

"I understand that," she said. "But you are worthy, my dear one."

When she said that he knew that he could never tell her.

"I must try," he muttered. "I'll try--from to-day."

She did not talk to him any more. Her instinct told her not to. Almost

directly they were walking down to the priest's house. She did not know

which of them had moved first.

When they got there they found Lucrezia up. Her eyes were red, but she

smiled at Hermione. Then she looked at the padrone with alarm. She

expected him to blame her for having disobeyed his orders of the day

before. But he had forgotten all about that.

"Get breakfast, Lucrezia," Hermione said. "We'll have it on the terrace.

And presently we must have a talk. The sick signore is coming up to-day

for collazione. We must have a very nice collazione, but something

wholesome."

"Si, signora."

Lucrezia went away to the kitchen thankfully. She had heard bad news of

Sebastiano yesterday in the village. He was openly in love with the girl

in the Lipari Isles. Her heart was almost breaking, but the return of the

padrona comforted her a little. Now she had some one to whom she could

tell her trouble, some one who would sympathize.

"I'll go and take a bath, Hermione," Maurice said.

And he, too, disappeared.

Hermione went to talk to Gaspare and tell him what to get in Marechiaro.

When breakfast was ready Maurice came back looking less pale, but still

unboyish. All the bright sparkle to which Hermione was accustomed had

gone out of him. She wondered why. She had expected the change in him to

be a passing thing, but it persisted.

At breakfast it was obviously difficult for him to talk. She sought a

reason for his strangeness. Presently she thought again of Artois. Could

he be the reason? Or was Maurice now merely preoccupied by that great,

new knowledge that there would soon be a third life mingled with theirs?

She wondered exactly what he felt about that. He was really such a boy at

heart despite his set face of to-day. Perhaps he dreaded the idea of

responsibility. His agitation upon the mountain-top had been intense.

Perhaps he was rendered unhappy by the thought of fatherhood. Or was it

Emile?

When breakfast was over, and he was smoking, she said to him: "Maurice, I want to ask you something."