CHAPTER III.
There was no one but himself in the two rooms, through which he now paced to and fro. Through the unglazed windows, only closed by wooden shutters, the wind blew in still more refreshingly than on the calm sea, and the solitude pleased him. He paused before the little picture of the Virgin, and gazed thoughtfully at the silver paper star-glory pasted around it. Yet he thought not of prayer. For what should he pray now, when he had nothing more to hope for!
And to-day the sun seemed to stand still.
He longed for night, for he was weary, and the loss of blood had affected him more than he would confess. He felt a violent pain in his hand, seated himself on a stool, and loosened the bandage. The repressed blood sprang forwards again, and his hand was much swollen around the wound. He washed it carefully, and held it long in the cold water. When he withdrew it he could plainly see the marks of Lauretta's teeth. "She was right," he said to himself; "I was a brute and deserved no better. I will send her back her handkerchief to-morrow morning by Giuseppe, for me shall she never see again." He washed the handkerchief carefully, and spread it out in the sun, after he had bound up his maimed limb again as well as he could with his left hand and his teeth. Then he threw himself upon his bed and closed his eyes.
The bright moon and the pain of his hand awoke him out of a half sleep. He sprang up to calm the throbbing beat of the blood in cold water, when he heard a rustling at his door. "Who is there?" he said, and opened it. Lauretta stood before him.
Without saying much she entered. She threw aside the handkerchief she had worn over her head, and placed a basket on the table. Then she drew a deep sigh.
"You are come for your handkerchief," he said; "you might have spared yourself the trouble, for tomorrow morning I should have asked Giuseppe to take it to you."
"It is not for the handkerchief," she answered, hastily; "I have been on the mountain gathering herbs that are good for wounds--there!" and she raised the cover of her basket.
"Too much trouble," he said, without any harshness--"too much trouble. It is better already--much better; and even if it were worse, I have deserved it. What do you do here so late? If any one were to see you--you know how they talk, though they know not what they say?"
"I do not trouble myself about them," she answered vehemently; "but your hand I must see, and put herbs upon it, for you can never do it with your left."
"I assure you that there is no necessity for such trouble!"
"Then let me see it, that I may believe it."
She seized his hand before he could prevent her, and untied the bandage. When she saw the angry swelling, she shrank together, and screamed "Jesus, Maria!"
"It is a little swollen," he said; "a day and a night will put it all right again."
She shook her head. "You will not be at sea again for a week!"
"The day after to-morrow, I hope--what does it matter?"
In the mean time she had found a basin, and washed the wound afresh, which he suffered her to do like a child; then she laid the healing leaves of the herbs upon it, which soon assuaged the burning pain, and bound up the hand with strips of linen which she had brought with her.
When she had finished, he said, "I thank you--and listen--if you will do me one kindness more--'forgive me for letting such madness get possession of me to-day, and forget all that I have said and done. I do not know myself how it all happened. You never gave me any cause for it--never, never! And you shall never more hear anything from me that can annoy you."
"It is I who have to pray for your pardon," she said, interrupting him; "I should have told you all, differently and better, and not have irritated you by my rude manner; and now, even this wound----"
"It was necessary, and high time that I was brought to my senses! and, as I said, it is of no consequence--do not talk of forgiveness. You have done me good, and I thank you for it. And now go to rest, and there--there is your handkerchief--you can take it with you now."
He offered it to her, but she stood still and seemed to struggle with herself; at last, she said, "You have lost your jacket on my account, and I know that you had the money for the oranges in your pockets. It struck me just now--I cannot replace it at once, for I have not sufficient, and if I had it would belong to my mother; but here I have the silver cross that the painter laid on the table the last time he was with us; I have never seen it since, and do not care to keep it longer in my box. If you sell it--it is well worth a couple of piastres, my mother said--it would help to repair your loss, and what may be wanting I will try to gain by spinning at night, when my mother is asleep."
"I shall not take it!" he said, shortly, pushing back the glittering cross she had taken from her pocket.
"You must take it," she cried; "who knows how long you may be laid up with your hand? There it lies, and I will never set my eyes on it again!"
"Then throw it into the sea!"
"It is no present that I make you--it is only what you have a right to, and what I owe you."
"A right to! I have no right to anything from you! If you should happen to meet me in future, do me one kindness--do not look at me, that I may not think that you are putting me in mind of how I have offended you. And now--good night!--and let it be the last."
He laid her handkerchief in the basket, placed the cross on the top of it, and closed the lid. When he looked up and saw her face, he started. Large, heavy tears rolled over her cheeks--she let them run their course unheeded.
"Maria Santissima!" he cried. "Are you ill? You tremble from head to foot!"
"It is nothing," she said--"I will go home:" and turned towards the door. Then a burst of weeping overcame her; she pressed her forehead against the doorpost, and sobbed loud and vehemently. Before he could reach her, she turned suddenly round and cast herself upon his neck. "I cannot, cannot bear it," she cried, and clung to him like a dying man to life. "I cannot bear to hear you saying kind words to me, and telling me to leave you, with all the fault on my conscience! Beat me--trample me under your feet--curse me--or, if it be true that you love me still, after all the ill that I have done you, then take me and keep me, and make of me what you will, but send me not thus away from you----" Fresh vehement sobs interrupted her.
He held her awhile in his arms, stricken dumb. "If I love you still!" he cried. "Holy Madonna! do you think that all my heart's blood has run out of that little wound? Do you not feel it beating in my breast, as if it would spring out, and to you? If you only say it to try me--or from pity to me--there, go, and I will even forget this too! You shall not think that you are indebted to me because you know what I suffer for you."
"No!" she said, firmly, raising her forehead from his shoulder, and gazing passionately in his face with her wet eyes--"I love you; and if I only say it now, I have long feared and fought against it--and now will I change, for I can no longer bear to look at you when you pass me in the street: and now I will kiss you too," she said, "that you may say if you doubt again, 'She has kissed me!' and, Lauretta kisses no one but the man she takes as her husband."
She kissed him thrice, and then freed herself from his arms, and said, "Good night, darling! Now sleep, and heal your hand; and do not come with me, for I fear no one now--but thee!"
Therewith she glided through the doorway, and disappeared in the shadow of the wall; but he looked long through the window, and over the sea, over which all the stars seemed trembling.
The next time the little Padre Curato emerged from the confessional, by which Lauretta had been a long time kneeling, he laughed quietly to himself. "Who would have thought it," he murmured, "that God would so soon have taken pity on this strange heart? And I was blaming myself for not having attacked the demon of obstinacy more fiercely! But our eyes are too short-sighted for the ways of Heaven! And now, may God bless them both, and let me live till Lauretta's eldest boy can go to sea in his father's place."
Ay! ay! ay! La Rabbiata!