A Spirit in Prison Part 33

"Why specially?"

"I've committed an unusual crime. I've made--actually--an engagement for this evening."

Artois and Vere held up their hands in exaggerated surprise.

"Are you mad, my dear Hermione?" asked Artois.

"I believe I am. It's dangerous to go to Naples. I met a young man."

"The Marchesino!" cried Vere. "The Marchesino! I see him in your eye, Madre."

"C'est cela!" said Artois, "and you mean to say--!"

"That I accepted an invitation to dine with him to-night, at nine, at the Scoglio di Frisio. There! Why did I? I have no idea. I was hot from a horrible vicolo. He was cool from the sea. What chance had I against him? And then he is through and through Neapolitan, and gives no quarter to a woman, even when she is 'una vecchia.'"

As she finished Hermione broke into a laugh, evidently at some recollection.

"Doro made his eyes very round. I can see that," said Artois.

"Like this!" cried Vere.

And suddenly there appeared in her face a reminiscence of the face of the Marchesino.

"Vere, you must not! Some day you will do it by accident when he is here."

"Is he coming here?"

"In a launch to fetch me--us."

"Am I invited?" said Vere. "What fun!"

"I could not get out of it," Hermione said to Artois. "But now I insist on your staying here till the Marchesino comes. Then he will ask you, and we shall be a quartet."

"I will stay," said Artois, with a sudden return of his authoritative manner.

"It seems that I am woefully ignorant of the Bay," continued Hermione.

"I have never dined at Frisio's. Everybody goes there at least once.

Everybody has been there. Emperors, kings, queens, writers, singers, politicians, generals--they all eat fish at Frisio's."

"It's true."

"You have done it?"

"Yes. The Padrone is worth knowing. He--but to-night you will know him.

Yes, Frisio's is characteristic. Vere will be amused."

With a light tone he hid a faint chagrin.

"What fun!" repeated Vere. "If I had diamonds I should put them on."

She too was hiding something, one sentiment with another very different.

But her youth came to her aid, and very soon the second excitement really took the place of the first, and she was joyously alive to the prospect of a novel gayety.

"I must not eat anything more," said Hermione. "I believe the Marchesino is ordering something marvellous for us, all the treasures of the sea.

We must be up to the mark. He really is a good fellow."

"Yes," said Artois. "He is. I have a genuine liking for him."

He said it with obvious sincerity.

"I am going," said Vere. "I must think about clothes. And I must undo my hair again and get Maria to dry it thoroughly, or I shall look frightening."

She went out quickly, her eyes sparkling.

"Vere is delighted," said Hermione.

"Yes, indeed she is."

"And you are not. Would you rather avoid the Marchesino to-night, Emile, and not come with us? Perhaps I am selfish. I would so very much rather have you with us."

"If Doro asks me I shall certainly come. It's true that I wish you were not engaged to-night--I should have enjoyed a quiet evening here. But we shall have many quiet, happy evenings together this summer, I hope."

"I wonder if we shall?" said Hermione, slowly.

"You--why?"

"I don't know. Oh, I am absurd, probably. One has such strange ideas, houses based on sand, or on air, or perhaps on nothing at all."

She got up, went to her writing-table, opened a drawer, and took out of it a letter.

"Emile," she said, coming back to him with it in her hand, "would you like to explain this to me?"

"What is it?"

"The letter I found from you when I came back from Capri."

"But does it need explanation?"

"It seemed to me as if it did. Read it and see."

He took it from her, opened it and read it.

"Well?" he said.

"Isn't the real meaning between the lines?"

"If it is, cannot you decipher it?"