"Who is that?" he asked quickly. "I thought you were alone."
"It is his wife," Helen answered, not without some fear. "See, she has fainted."
Mr. Thurwell hesitated only for a moment. Then his face filled with compassion.
"God help her;" he said solemnly. "I will send the women up to you, and a doctor. God help her!"
CHAPTER XLII
AT LAST
The morning sunlight lay upon that wonderful fair garden of the villa. The tall white lilies, the scarlet poppies, the clustering japonica, the purple hyacinths, and the untrimmed brilliantly-flowering shrubs, lifted their heads before its sweet, quickening warmth, and yielded up their perfume to the still clear air. The languorous hour of noon was still far off. It was the birth of a southern summer day, and everything was fresh and pure, untainted by the burning, enervating heat which was soon to dry up the sweetness from the earth, and the freshness from the slightly moving breeze. Away on the brown hills, fading into a transparent veil of blue, the bright dresses of the peasant women stooping at their toil, the purple glory of the vineyards, and the deep, quiet green of the olive groves—all these simple characteristics of the pastoral landscape were like brilliant patches of coloring upon a fitting background. Soon the haze of the noonday heat would hang upon the earth, deadening the purity of its color, and making the air heavy and oppressive with faint overladen perfumes. But as yet the sun lay low in the heavens, and the earth beneath was like a fair still picture.
The heavy lumbering coach which connected the little town with the outside world was drawn up at the gate of the villa, and twice the quaintly sounding horn had broken the morning stillness. It was a moment of farewell, a farewell not for days or for years, but forever.
Their words denied it, yet in their hearts was that certain conviction, and much of that peculiar sadness which it could not fail to bring. Yet she would not have them stay for the end. She had bidden them go, and the hour had come.