The Padrone, who had seemed paralysed until now, came as suddenly to life as Sophy had turned to stone.
"Il dottore!" he shouted imperiously. "Vaa cercare il dottore!"
Now Peppin had reached the spot about which the boats were gathered. He trod water with head bent low, peering intently into the blue depths. The boats hung near. The boatmen shouted more than ever. They pointed downwards. "L'è lit! L'è lit!" they cried eagerly. All at once the sailor dived. It was as if he turned a somersault in the water. His bare, wet legs flashed up into the sunshine as he plunged.
Long seconds went by ... an eternity of minute-long seconds. Yet through this horror of blank pause, wherein time seemed suspended ... which might have been a day or an æon ... Sophy stood waiting for Peppin to bring her husband back to her. She was sure that Peppin would not come back without him. The primordial woman in her had recognised primordial man in the stout sailor. The feminine at its limit waited on the completion of virility. What she could not do, Peppin was doing. So she waited while cycles seemed to pass. She had lost her sense of time.
A sudden roar went up—from the shore, from the waiting boats. The dark blob of Peppin's head had appeared above water. Then it was submerged again for an instant. But now the boats were closer—arms reached out. He was caught—sustained by those eager arms—he and his burden. Ah!—they were trying to lift what Peppin grasped into a boat—but that huge, flaccid body dragged the boatedge over—down—down to the very water. A mass of clutching hands grasped here, there. Now it was half over the edge—but the boat lay on her side. The great, naked body glistened white like a monstrous fish in the sunlight. Now ... now ... all together!
There was another roar. Then the sailor also was hauled aboard.... The boat pulled for shore....
XLIII
They lifted him out and laid him on the warm beach. The crowd stood aside, respectful and expectant. All eyes turned to Sophy. They were waiting for the thrilling moment when the stone image would spring to life, shriek and cast itself upon her husband's body. There was a hush as in a theatre, just before the eagerly expected catastrophe breaks into a scream or dagger-stroke. But the moment failed of its zest. Slowly, as though moving in its sleep, the tall figure went over to the drowned man, knelt down beside him, laid a white hand on the drenched, sunburnt chest. Then she looked dully up at Peppin, who stood by, honest pity on his rough face, the water that streamed from his clothes making a little patter on the hot pebbles.
"It doesn't beat," she said in English, not heeding that the man could not understand her. "What will you do now...?" she asked. And her eyes still gazed up at the sailor as though he had been God.