She came close up to him.
"Why do you want to go alone?" she asked.
Without knowing it, she, too, spoke in an under-voice.
"What is it you are afraid of?" she added.
"I am not afraid."
"Yes," she said, "you are. Your hand is quite cold."
"Let me go alone, signora."
"No, Gaspare. There is nothing to be afraid of, I believe. But if--if there should have been an accident, I ought to be there. The padrone is my husband, remember."
She went on and he followed her.
Hermione had spoken firmly, even almost cheerfully, to comfort the boy, whose uneasiness was surely greater than the occasion called for. So many little things may happen to delay a man. And Maurice might really have made the detour to Marechiaro on his way home. If he had, then they would miss him by taking this path through the ravine. Hermione knew that, but she did not hesitate to take it. She could not remain inactive to-night.
Patience was out of her reach. It was only by making a strong effort that she had succeeded in waiting that short time on the terrace. Now she could wait no longer. She was driven. Although she had not yet sincerely acknowledged it to herself, fear was gradually taking possession of her, a fear such as she had never yet known or even imagined.
She had never yet known or imagined such a fear. That she felt. But she had another feeling, contradictory, surely. It began to seem to her as if this fear, which was now coming upon her, had been near her for a long time, ever since the night when she knew that she was going to Africa.
Had she not even expressed it to Maurice?
Those beautiful days and nights of perfect happiness--can they ever come again? Had she not thought that many times? Was it not the voice of this fear which had whispered those words, and others like them, to her mind?
And had there not been omens? Had there not been omens?
She heard Gaspare"s feet behind her in the ravine, and it seemed to her that she could tell by the sound of them upon the many little loose stones that he was wild with impatience, that he was secretly cursing her for obliging him to go so slowly. Had he been alone he would have sped down with a rapidity almost like that of travelling light. She was strong, active. She was going fast. Instinctively she went fast. But she was a woman, not a boy.
"I can"t help it, Gaspare!"
She was saying that mentally, saying it again and again, as she hurried onward.
Had there not been omens?
That last letter of hers, whose loss had prevented Maurice from meeting her on her return, from welcoming her! When she had reached the station of Cattaro, and had not seen him upon the platform, she had felt "I have lost him." Afterwards, directly almost, she had laughed at the feeling as absurd. But she had had it. And then, when at last he had come, she had been moved to suggest that he might like to sleep outside upon the terrace. And he had agreed to the suggestion. They had not resumed their old, sweet relation of husband and wife.
Had there not been omens?
And only an hour ago, scarcely that, not that, she had knelt before the Madonna della Rocca and she had prayed, she had prayed pa.s.sionately for deserted women, for women who loved and who had lost those whom they loved.
The fear was upon her fully now, and she fully knew that it was. Why had she prayed for lonely, deserted women? What had moved her to such a prayer?
"Was I praying for myself?"
At that thought a physical weakness came to her, and she felt as if she could not go on. By the side of the path, growing among pointed rocks, there was a gnarled olive-tree, whose branches projected towards her.
Before she knew what she was doing she had caught hold of one and stood still. So suddenly she had stopped that Gaspare, unprepared, came up against her in the dark.
"Signora! What is the matter?"
His voice was surely angry. For a moment she thought of telling him to go on alone, quickly.
"What is it, signora?"
"Nothing--only--I"ve walked so fast. Wait one minute!"
She felt the agony of his impatience, and it seemed to her that she was treating him very cruelly to-night.
"You know, Gaspare," she said, "it"s not easy for women--this rough walking, I mean. We"ve got our skirts."
She laughed. How unnatural, how horrible her laugh sounded in the darkness! He did not say any more. She knew he was wondering why she had laughed like that. After a moment she let go the branch. But her legs were trembling, and she stumbled when she began to walk on.
"Signora, you are tired already. You had better let me go alone."
For the first time she told him a lie.
"I should be afraid to wait here all by myself in the night," she said.
"I couldn"t do that."
"Who would come?"
"I should be frightened."
She thought she saw him look at her incredulously in the dark, but was not sure.
"Be kind to me to-night, Gaspare!" she said.
She felt a sudden pa.s.sionate need of gentleness, of support, a woman"s need of sympathy.
"Won"t you?" she added.
"Signora!" he said.
His voice sounded shocked, she thought; but in a moment, when they came to an awkward bit of the path, he put his hand under her arm, and very carefully, almost tenderly, helped her over it. Tears rushed into her eyes. For such a small thing she was crying! She turned her head so that Gaspare should not see, and tried to control her emotion. That terrible question kept on returning to her heart.
"Was I praying for myself when I prayed at the shrine of the Madonna della Rocca?"
Hermione was gifted, or cursed, with imagination, and as she never made use of her imaginative faculty in any of the arts, it was, perhaps, too much at the service of her own life. In happiness it was a beautiful handmaid, helping her to greater joy, but in unhappy, or in only anxious moments, it was, as it usually is, a cursed thing. It stood at her elbow, then, like a demon full of suggestions that were terrible. With an inventiveness that was diabolic it brought vividly before her scenes to shake the stoutest courage. It painted the future black. It showed her the world as a void. And in that void she was as something falling, falling, yet reaching nothing.
Now it was with her in the ravine, and as she asked questions, terrible questions, it gave her terrible answers. And it reminded her of other omens--it told her these facts were really omens--which till now she had not thought of.
Why had both she and Maurice been led to think and to speak of death to-day?
Upon the mountain-top the thought of death had come to her when she looked at the glory of the dawn. She had said to Maurice, ""The mountains will endure"--but we!" Of course it was a truism, such a thing as she might say at any time when she was confronted by the profound stability of nature. Thousands of people had said much the same thing on thousands of occasions. Yet now the demon at her elbow whispered to her that the remark had had a peculiar significance. She had even said, "What is it makes one think most of death when--when life, new life, is very near?"
Existence is made up of loss and gain. New beings rush into life day by day and hour by hour. Birth is about us, but death is about us too. And when we are given something, how often is something also taken from us!
Was that to be her fate?
And Maurice--he had been led to speak of death, afterwards, just as he was going away to the sea. She recalled his words, or the demon whispered them over to her: