"Prego, prego, Maman!" he murmured in a colourless voice.
"Yes, that I had to do," continued his mother firmly; "for, as I said, there is no issue. Mrs. Chesney has her son. Should you ever care for her—should she ever care for you—her son stands between you. If she were to desert her boy for you—she would not deserve your love. If you wanted her to desert him—you would not deserve hers——"
"Maman! Te ne scongiuro!" cried Amaldi, springing to his feet. She could see his face white as silver in the heavy dusk. His brows made a straight line across it.
"I have finished, my son," she said, with dignity. "You will never hear me allude to this again."
And she left him.
XXXIII
The finding of a suitable villa for Sophy proved to be quite an undertaking. Three days did the kindly Marchesa devote to helping her in this quest. And as they chugged about the Lake in the little Fretta, Sophy grew more and more impressed with the hideousness of the houses that man had thrust upon this lovely nature. She had dreamed of columns—white columns rising from groves of lemon and orange, reflected in pale blue water. The reality was a noticeable lack of these trees and a collection of ugly boxes, now bristling with ginger-bread towers, gilded, pricked out, machicolated, decorated in red and blue, now roofed and verandahed in clumsy imitation of Swiss chalets, the stucco walls painted to represent yellow wood. Sometimes these houses would be ornamented with gaudy flowers like a frieze of chintz; sometimes they would wriggle all over with the results of modern graffito work. Only a few villas, here and there, were simple and attractive in architecture—and these were always old buildings, not to be rented.
Sophy was in despair. She thought she had better remain at the Hotel Bellevue or slip over to the Eden Hotel in Pallanza. But the Marchesa never gave up an idea once she had determined to accomplish it. So, finally, they found in the "Villa Bianca," near Ghiffa, what even Sophy admitted was the very thing.
It took her two weeks to get settled—to have the walls whitewashed, and to cover the frightful furniture with slips of chintz. She was so busy over this that she had no time to feel lonely, though Amaldi and his mother came to see her only once during that period. The letters from Anne Harding were very encouraging. Bobby looked like a bit of brown bisque and had already gained in weight. It was wonderful after the day's bustle to sit on the broad, flagged terrace that overlooked the Lake. Two huge cypresses towered on either side. At the foot of the priestly trees two oleanders in full bloom spread their pinky skirts, like court ladies kneeling in perfumed humility before stern spiritual directors. Their heady fragrance streamed through the night, stirring vague desires and regrets. The stars swung low, plaques of quick-gold. The grim Stone of Iron across the lake had changed to tourmaline—reddish at one end, dusky violet at the other, as the glow from the lime-kiln at Chaldee lit it to the east and the soft starlight to the west. Yes, this, too, was Italy. And there came to her a strange, elusive sense as of heart-break for sorrows long forgotten when a nightingale began its desperate, sweet cry of passion forever unassuaged. She had thought that in England she had first heard the nightingale. It was not so. This was the true flame of song; that had been but the flame's shadow. In ecstatic staves the tiny soul flung out its supernal melody, as though weaving a poem in music—sapphics of sound—stanzas ending each time with a new melodic phrase—the cry of a celestial Improvisatrice, singing against the morning stars. It brought the sense of infinity—as though from everlasting to everlasting that marvellous ritornello might go pealing on....