The Call of the Blood - Page 289/317

Presently the clock Gaspare had brought from the fair chimed, then played

the "Tre Colori." Lucrezia had set it to play that evening when she was

waiting for the padrone to return from the sea.

When he heard the tinkling tune Gaspare lifted his head and listened till

it was over. It recalled to him all the glories of the fair. He saw his

padrone before him. He remembered how he had decorated Maurice with

flowers, and he felt as if his heart would break.

"The povero signorino! the povero signorino!" he cried, in a choked

voice. "And I put roses above his ears! Si, signora, I did! I said he

should be a real Siciliano!"

He began to rock himself to and fro. His whole body shook, and his face

had a frantic expression that suggested violence.

"I put roses above his ears!" he repeated. "That day he was a real

Siciliano!"

"Gaspare--Gaspare--hush! Don't! Don't!"

She held his hand and went on speaking softly.

"We must be quiet in here. We must remember to be quiet. It isn't our

fault, Gaspare. We did all we could to make him happy. We ought to be

glad of that. You did everything you could, and he loved you for it. He

was happy with us. I think he was. I think he was happy till the very

end. And that is something to be glad of. Don't you think he was very

happy here?"

"Si, signora!" the boy whispered, with twitching lips.

"I'm glad I came back in time," Hermione said, looking at the dark hair

on the pillow. "It might have happened before, while I was away. I'm glad

we had one more day together."

Suddenly, as she said that, something in the mere sound of the words

seemed to reveal more clearly to her heart what had befallen her, and for

the first time she began to cry and to remember. She remembered all

Maurice's tenderness for her, all his little acts of kindness. They

seemed to pass rapidly in procession through her mind on their way to her

heart. Not one surely was absent. How kind to her he had always been! And

he could never be kind to her again. And she could never be kind to

him--never again.

Her tears went on falling quietly. She did not sob like Gaspare. But she

felt that now she had begun to cry she would never be able to stop again;

that she would go on crying till she, too, died.