IV.
The old cloister of Santa Croce, with its classic columns, had today a festive appearance. In front of the garden, sloping down at the mountain's side, one gets a glimpse at the river Sarno, where the Porta di Stabia once was located, and the image of Minerva in terra cotta—the guardian Deity of Pompeii, was excavated intact, now in the Museum at Naples.
The old chapel was gayly decorated with rare flowers and tropical plants today, and the finest adornments of the ancient cloister, which had slumbered peacefully and been forgotten in their cupboards for a century, were brought out by the serving brothers, and cleansed and dusted of their cobwebs. They whispered excitedly putting their heads together, for the marriage of a high-born couple was a rare event within these ancient walls.
The fat prior smiled in the triple folds of his chin, on all the preparations, with quite unusual benevolence. His little steel-gray eyes, keen and shrewd in their glance, fairly sparkled as he thought of the rich fee which would come to his cloister on such an occasion from a generous noble house.
The cook of the monastery, Brother Salvatore, had some days earlier announced the festive event to Concetta's father, who supplied them with fish on fast-days. Concetta was quite childishly delighted. A noble wedding—the handsome pair—the rich costumes—all that she had never seen in her whole life; so she teased her father until he promised to take her to the wedding. Her cheeks glowed, her big eyes sparkled with pleasure, when she was sitting in the boat in her Sunday best and thinking of all the splendors that were going to be exhibited before her.
"If I understood aright the look Saint Cecelia gave me, I shall soon be standing there too!" she whispered to herself with a happy smile, while her father sat opposite her and plied the oars with accustomed hands. "Oh, the happiness, the happiness of belonging to him!" she went on in her whispered colloquy with herself, both hands clasped before her face, blushing with maidenly modesty.
Gloomy clouds began to obscure the sun. The magnificent landscape was in a few minutes wrapped, as it were, in a dark veil of mist. With shining eyes she sat in the boat watching the sky, and drinking draughts of joy with which mingled no drop of sin or selfishness in its crystal waves of purity; for she had grown up with nature as ignorant as her plants at home, of the roar and strife, the burning hate and cunning intrigue of the great world of men and women.
Frequent puffs of wind made the boat now tremble and rock. The fear of an approaching storm had laid hold of the animal world as well; the terrified sea-gulls flew wildly over Concetta's head, while a hideous owl in the neighboring olive-grove uttered its long-drawn, harsh notes, which floated out over the river. Concetta saw and heard nothing. Her thoughts were with the man to whom she had given herself in almost superhuman love, whom she was tempted to adore like the holy image of Christ before which she knelt in lowly reverence, imploring His blessing on her beloved.