She drew her hand away abruptly, and they pa.s.sed out into the moonlight again. Ahead of them where the road branched into the highway, the others were waiting for Constance to catch up, the two officers looking back with an eager air of expectation. Tony glanced ahead and added with a quick frown.
"But perhaps I do not need to tell you that--you may know it already?"
"You are impertinent, Tony."
She pulled the donkey into a trot that left him behind.
The highway was broad and they proceeded in a group, the conversation general and in English, Tony quite naturally having no part in it. But at the corners where the road to the village and the road to the villa separated, Fidilini obligingly turned stubborn again. His mind bent upon rest and supper, he insisted upon going to the village; the harder Constance pulled on the left rein, the more fixed was his determination to turn to the right.
"Help! I"m being run away with again," she called over her shoulder as the donkey"s pace quickened into a trot.
Tony, awakening to his duty, started in pursuit, while the others laughingly shouted directions. He did not run as determinedly as he might and they had covered considerable ground before he overtook them.
He turned Fidilini"s head and they started back--at a walk.
"Signorina," said Tony, "may I ask a question, a little impertinent?"
"No, certainly not."
Silence.
"Ah, Tony?" she asked presently.
"_Si_, signorina?"
"What is it you want to ask?"
"Are you going to marry that Italian lieutenant--or perhaps the captain?"
"That _is_ impertinent."
"Are you?"
"You forget yourself, Tony. It is not your place to ask such a question."
"_Si_, signorina; it is my place. If it is true I cannot be your donkey-man any longer."
"No, it is not true, but that is no concern of yours."
"Are you going on another trip Friday--to Monte Maggiore?"
"Yes."
"May I come with you?"
His tone implied more than his words. She hesitated a moment, then shrugged indifferently.
"Just as you please, Tony. If you don"t wish to work for us any more I dare say we can find another man."
"It is as you please, signorina. If you wish it, I come, if you do not wish it, I go."
She made no answer. They joined the others and the party proceeded to the villa gates.
Lieutenant di Ferara helped Constance dismount, while Captain Coroloni, with none too good a grace, held the donkey. A careful observer would have fancied that the lieutenant was ahead, and that both he and the captain knew it. Tony untied the bundles, dumped them on the kitchen floor, and waited respectfully, hat in hand, while Mr. Wilder searched his pockets for change. He counted out four lire and added a note. Tony pocketed the lire and returned the note, while Mr. Wilder stared his astonishment.
"Good-bye, Tony," Constance smiled as he turned away.
"Good-bye, signorina." There was a note of finality in his voice.
"Well!" Mr. Wilder e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed. "That is the first--" "Italian" he started to say, but he caught the word before it was out "--donkey-driver I ever saw refuse money."
Lieutenant di Ferara raised his shoulders.
"_Mache_! The fellow is too honest; you do well to watch him." There was a world of disgust in his tone.
Constance glanced after the retreating figure and laughed.
"Tony!" she called.
He kept on; she raised her voice.
"Mr. Yamhankeesh."
He paused.
"You call, signorina?"
"Be sure and be here by half past six on Friday morning; we must start early."
"Sank you, signorina. Good-night."
"Good-night, Tony."
CHAPTER VIII
The Hotel du Lac may be approached in two ways. The ordinary, obvious way, which incoming tourists of necessity choose, is by the highroad and the gate. But the romantic way is by water. One sees only the garden then and the garden is the distinguished feature of the place; it was planned long before the hotel was built to adorn a marquis"s pleasure house.
There are grottos, arbors, fountains, a winding stream; and, stretching the length of the water front, a deep cool grove of interlaced plane trees. At the end of the grove, half a dozen broad stone steps dip down to a tiny harbor which is carpeted on the surface with lily pads. The steps are worn by the lapping waves of fifty years, and are grown over with slippery, slimy water weeds.
The world was just stirring from its afternoon siesta, when the _Farfalla_ dropped her yellow sails and floated into the shady little harbor. Giuseppe prodded and pushed along the fern-grown banks until the keel jolted against the water steps. He sprang ash.o.r.e and steadied the boat while Constance alighted. She slipped on the mossy step--almost went under--and righted herself with a laugh that rang gaily through the grove.
She came up the steps still smiling, shook out her fluffy pink skirts, straightened her rose-trimmed hat, and glanced reconnoiteringly about the grove. One might reasonably expect, attacking the hotel as it were from the flank, to capture unawares any stray guest. But aside from a chaffinch or so and a brown-and-white spotted calf tied to a tree, the grove was empty--blatantly empty. There was a shade of disappointment in Constance"s glance. One naturally does not like to waste one"s best embroidered gown on a spotted calf.
Then her eye suddenly brightened as it lighted on a vivid splash of yellow under a tree. She crossed over and picked it up--a paper covered French novel; the t.i.tle was _Bijou_, the author was Gyp. She turned to the first page. Any reasonably careful person might be expected to write his name in the front of a book--particularly a French book--before abandoning it to the mercies of a foreign hotel. But the several fly leaves were immaculately innocent of all sign of ownership.
So intent was she upon this examination, that she did not hear footsteps approaching down the long arbor that led from the house; so intent was the young man upon a frowning scrutiny of the path before him, that he did not see Constance until he had pa.s.sed from the arbor into the grove.