She was silent.
"I certainly did not believe it then," continued Reinhold bitterly, "and to-day's meeting makes me doubt more than ever that your heart suffered from a separation which certainly wounded your pride more deeply than I had ever deemed possible. You need not guard the door so anxiously; I see, indeed, that I must first dash you aside in order to reach the child, and that courage I possess not. You have conquered this time; I renounce my purpose of seeing him again. Farewell!"
He went. She heard his steps outside on the terrace, then the rustle of the shrubs as he pushed his way through them, and at last the stroke of the oars, which bore the boat away from the shore. The wife breathed more freely, and left the place she had defended so energetically. She went to the glass door; perhaps a slight anxiety arose in her as to whether the venturesome leap from the terrace would be as successful as the ascent to it had been, but in the darkness nothing could be distinguished. As before, the sea lay in idle calm. Far above, the still, sultry night spread its wings, and flowers bloomed all around, but every trace of Reinhold had disappeared.
CHAPTER II.
The clear balmy spring days were followed by summer's burning glow. The gulf and its environs lay day after day illuminated by the sun in all their beauty, but also in the almost tropical heat of the south; only the sea breeze brought any coolness, so that the sea was the object of most excursions which were now undertaken.
This repose of nature, which had continued for some weeks, was followed at last by an outbreak; a thunderstorm raged in the air, and stirred up the ocean to its innermost depths. The storm had come up so quickly, broken loose so suddenly, that no one had been prepared for it, and it had lasted for more than an hour already, with undiminished fury.
A boat shot through the foaming waves, and, apparently overtaken by the storm, found itself struggling with the billows. For some time it had been in danger of being seized without hope of rescue, and dashed out into the open sea, but now with full sails set it flew towards the coast, and after a few futile attempts succeeded at last in being landed.
"That is really racing with the storm for a wager," cried Hugo Almbach, as he, wet through with rain and spray, was the first to spring on shore. "For this once we have fortunately escaped the wet embrace of the goddess of the sea. We were near enough to her."
"It was lucky having such a true sailor with us," said Marchese Tortoni, following him in a not less wet condition. "It was a master-work, Signor Capitano, bringing us safely on shore in such a storm. We should have been lost without you." Reinhold lifted the half unconscious Signora Biancona, who clung to him, trembling and deadly pale, out of the boat. "For heaven's sake, calm yourself, Beatrice! The danger is over," said he impatiently, as the last occupant of the boat, the English gentleman, who had been present at Hugo's former incognito discussion with Maestro Gianelli, also gained terra firma.
In the meanwhile, Jonas poured forth all his contempt upon the two sailors to whom the guidance had originally been entrusted, and who fortunately did not understand the terms of praise addressed to them in German.