"He says he is a Sicilian."
"Boys like that say anything if they can get something by it. Perhaps he thought you liked the Sicilians better than the Neapolitans. But anyhow--Sicilian or Neapolitan, it is all one! He is a Southerner, and at fifteen a Southerner is already a man. I was."
"I know it. But you were proving to me that the Signorina is a woman.
The fact that she, an English girl, is good friends with the fisher boy does not prove it."
"Ah, well!"
The Marchesino hesitated.
"I had seen the Signorina before I came to meet you at the house."
"Had you?"
"Didn"t you know it?"
"Yes, I did."
"I knew she told you."
"What?"
"She told you! she told you! She is birbante. She is a woman, for she pretended as only a woman can pretend."
"What did she pretend?"
"That she was not pleased at my coming, at my finding out where she lived, and seeking her. Why, Emilio, even when I was in the sea, when I was doing the seal, I could read the Signorina"s character. She showed me from the boat that she wanted me to come, that she wished to know me.
Ah, che simpatica! Che simpatica ragazza!"
The Marchesino looked once more at Ruffo.
"Come here a minute!" he said, in a low voice, not wishing to wake the still sleeping fishermen.
The boy jumped lightly out and came to them. When he stood still the Marchesino said, in his broadest Neapolitan:
"Now then, tell me the truth! I"m a Neapolitan, not a forestiere. You"ve seen me for years at the Mergellina."
"Si, Signore."
"You"re a Napolitano."
"No, Signore. I am a Sicilian."
There was a sound of pride in the boy"s voice.
"I am quite sure he speaks the truth," Artois said, in French.
"Why do you come here?" asked the Marchesino.
"Signore, I come to fish."
"For cigarettes?"
"No, Signore, for sarde. Buona notte, Signore."
He turned away from them with decision, and went back to his boat.
"He is a Sicilian," said Artois. "I would swear to it."
"Why? Hark at his accent."
"He is a Sicilian!"
"But why are you so sure?"
Artois only said:
"Are you going to fish?"
"Emilio, I cannot fish to-night. My soul is above such work as fishing.
It is indeed. Let us go back to Naples."
"Va bene."
Artois was secretly glad. He, too, had no mind--or was it no heart?--for fishing that night, after the episode of the islet. They hailed the sailors, who were really asleep this time, and were soon far out on the path of the moonlight setting their course towards Naples.
CHAPTER X
On the following morning Hermione and Vere went for an excursion to Capri. They were absent from the island for three nights. When they returned they found a card lying upon the table in the little hall--"Marchese Isidoro Panacci di Torno"--and Gaspare told them that it had been left by a Signore, who had called on the day of their departure, and had seemed very disappointed to hear that they were gone.
"I do not know this Signore," Gaspare added, rather grimly.
Vere laughed, and suddenly made her eyes look very round, and staring, and impudent.
"He"s like that, Gaspare," she said.
"Vere!" said her mother.
Then she added to Gaspare:
"The Marchese is a friend of Don Emilio"s. Ah! and here is a letter from Don Emilio."
It was lying beside the Marchese"s card with some other letters.
Hermione opened it first, and read that Artois had been unexpectedly called away to Paris on business, but intended to return to Naples as soon as possible, and to spend the whole summer on the Bay.
"I feel specially that this summer I should like to be near you," he wrote. "I hope you wish it."