"Oh! the beautiful dream!" she said, "the beautiful, beautiful—certainly!
Sweetheart, let us have done with all this philosophising and go back to
our palace, where we are happy in the temple of the greatest of all
Gods—the God of Love!"
Then she gave the order for home.
But on the way they stopped at Jesurum's, and she supervised Paul's purchases for his mother, and allowed him to buy herself some small gifts. And between them they spent a good deal of money, and laughed over it like happy children. So when they got back to the palazzo there was joy in their hearts like the sunlight of the late afternoon.
She would not let Paul go on to the loggia overlooking the Grand Canal. He had noticed as they passed that some high screens of lilac-bushes had been placed in front of the wide arched openings. No fear of prying eyes from opposite houses now! And yet they were not too high to prevent those in the loggia from seeing the moon and the sky. Their feast was preparing evidently, and he knew it would be a night of the gods.
But from then until it was time to dress for dinner his lady decreed that they should rest in their rooms.
"Thou must sleep, my Paul," she said, "so that thy spirit may be fresh for new joys."
And it was only after hard pleading she would allow him to have it that they rested on the other loggia couches, so that his closing eyes might know her near.
CHAPTER XIX
No Englishwoman would have thought of the details which made the Feast of the Full Moon so wonderful in Paul's eyes. It savoured rather of other centuries and the days of Imperial Rome, and indeed, had his lady been one of Britain's daughters, he too might have found it a little bizarre. As it was, it was all in the note—the exotic note of Venice and her spells.
The lady had gone to her room when he woke on the loggia, and he had only time to dress before the appointed moment when he was to meet her in the little salon.