A Spirit in Prison Part 94

"But, amico mio, you are deceptive, you workers," he said. "You take us all in. We are children beside you, we who say all we feel, who show when we hate and when we love. We are babies. If I ever want to become really birbante, I shall become a worker."

He spoke always lightly, laughingly; but Artois understood the malice at his heart, and hesitated for a moment whether to challenge it quietly and firmly, or whether laughingly, to accept the sly imputations of secrecy, of hypocrisy, in a "not-worth-while" temper. If things developed--and Artois felt that they must with such a protagonist as the Marchesino--a situation might arise in which Doro's enmity must come out into the open and be dealt with drastically. Till then was it not best to ignore it, to fall in with his apparent frivolity? Before Artois could decide--for his natural temper and an under-sense of prudence and contempt pulled different ways--the Marchesino suddenly released his arm, leaned over the balcony rail, and looked eagerly down the road. A carriage had just rattled up from the harbor of Santa Lucia only a few yards away.

"Ecco!" he exclaimed. "Ecco! But--but who is with them?"

"Only Gaspare," replied Artois.

"Gaspare! That servant who came to the Guiseppone? Oh, no doubt he has rowed the ladies over and will return to the boat?"

"No, I think not. I think the Signora will bring him to the Carmine."

"Why?" said the Marchesino, sharply.

"Why not? He is a strong fellow, and might be useful in a crowd."

"Are we not strong? Are we not useful?"

"My dear Doro, what's the matter?"

"Niente--niente!"

He tugged at his mustaches.

"Only I think the Signora might trust to us."

"Tell her so, if you like. Here she is."

At this moment the door opened and Hermione came in, followed by Vere.

As Artois went to welcome them he was aware of a strange mixture of sensations, which made these two dear and close friends, these intimates of his life, seem almost new. He was acutely conscious of the mist of which Hermione had thought. He wondered about her, as she about him. He saw again that face in the night under the trellis. He heard the voice that had called to him and Vere in the garden. And he knew that enmity, mysterious yet definite, might arise even between Hermione and him; that even they two--inexorably under the law that has made all human beings separate ent.i.ties, and incapable of perfect fusion--might be victims of misunderstanding, of ignorance of the absolute truth of personality.

Even now he was companioned by the sudden and horrible doubt which had attacked him in the garden: that perhaps she had been always playing a part when she had seemed to be deeply interested in his work, that perhaps there was within her some one whom he did not know, had never even caught a glimpse of until lately, once when she was in the tram going to the Scoglio di Frisio, and once the last time they had met. And yet this was the woman who had nursed him in Africa--and this was the woman against whose impulsive actions he had had the instinct to protect Vere--the Hermione Delarey whom he had known for so many years.

Never before had he looked at Hermione quite as he looked at her to-night. His sense of her strangeness woke up in him something that was ill at ease, doubtful, almost even suspicious, but also something that was quivering with interest.

For years this woman had been to him "dear Hermione," "ma pauvre amie,"

comrade, sympathizer, nurse, mother of Vere.

Now--what else was she? A human creature with a heart and brain capable of mystery; a soul with room in it for secret things; a temple whose outside he had seen, but whose G.o.d, perhaps, he had never seen.

And Vere was involved in her mother's strangeness, and had her own strangeness too. Of that he had been conscious before to-night. For Vere was being formed. The plastic fingers were at work about her, moulding her into what she must be as a woman.

But Hermione! She had been a woman so long.

Perhaps, too, she was standing on the brink of a precipice. That suspicion, that fear, not to be banished by action, added to the curiosity, as about an unknown land, that she aroused.

And the new and vital sense of Hermione's strangeness which was alive in Artois was met by a feeling in her that was akin to it, only of the feminine s.e.x.

Their eyes encountered like eyes that say, "What are you?"

After swift greeting they went down-stairs to dine in the public room.

As there were but few people in the house, the large dining-room was not in use, and their table was laid in the small restaurant that looks out on the Marina, and was placed close to the window.

"At last we are repeating our _partie carree_ of the Guiseppone," said Artois, as they sat down.

He felt that as host he must release himself from subtleties and under-feelings, must stamp down his consciousness of secret inquiries and of desires or hatreds half-concealed. He spoke cheerfully, even conventionally.

"Yes, but without the storm," said Hermione, in the same tone. "There is no feeling of electricity in the air to-night."

Even while she spoke she felt as if she were telling a lie which was obvious to them all. And she could not help glancing hastily round. She met the large round eyes of the Marchesino, eyes without subtlety though often expressive.

"No, Signora," he said, smiling at her, rather obviously to captivate her by the sudden vision of his superb teeth--"La Bruna is safe to-night."

"La Bruna?"

"The Madonna del Carmine."

They talked of the coming festa.

Vere was rather quiet, much less vehement in appearance and lively in manner than she had been at the Marchesino's dinner. Artois thought she looked definitely older than she had then, though even then she had played quite well the part of a little woman of the world. There was something subdued in her eyes to-night which touched him, because it made him imagine Vere sad. He wondered if she were still troubled about her mother, if she had fulfilled her intention and asked Gaspare what he thought. And he longed to ask her, to know what Gaspare had said. The remembrance of Gaspare made him say to Hermione:

"I gave orders that Gaspare was to have a meal here. Did they tell you?"

"Yes. He has gone to the servants' room."

The Marchesino's face changed.

"Your Gaspare seems indispensable, Signora," he said to Hermione in his lightest, most boyish manner--a manner that the determination in his eyes contradicted rather crudely. "Do you take him everywhere, like a little dog?"

"I often take him,--but not like a little dog, Marchese," Hermione said, quietly.

"Signora, I did not mean--Here in Naples, we use that expression for anything, or any one, we like to have always with us."

"I see. Well, call Gaspare a watch-dog if you like," she answered, with a smile; "he watches over me carefully."

"A watch-dog, Signora! But do you like to be watched? Is it not unpleasant?"

He was speaking now to get rid of the impression his first remark had evidently made upon her.

"I think it depends how," she replied. "If Gaspare watches me it is only to protect me--I am sure of that."

"But, Signora, do you not trust Don Emilio, do you not trust me, to be your watch-dogs to-night at the festa?"

There was a little pressure in his voice, but he still preserved his light and boyish manner. And now he turned to Vere.

"Speak for us, Signorina! Tell the Signora that we will take care of her to-night, that there is no need of the faithful Gaspare."

Vere looked at him gravely. She had wondered a little why her mother had brought Gaspare, why, at least, she had not left him free till they returned to the boat at Santa Lucia. But her mother wanted him to come with them, and that was enough for her. She opened her lips, and Artois thought she was going to snub her companion. But perhaps she suddenly changed her mind, for she only said:

"Who would trust you, Marchese?"