“You’ll come?” said Jack, turning quickly to Phillis.
It seemed to her afterwards as if she had been swept away by some impetuous force in his voice or manner. Was it the vibration of those words which she still heard, “Are you so blind? Don’t you see that the one thing he cares for is to please you?” Was it true—at last?
But the arrangement did not at all please Mrs Leyton. She said in an injured tone:—
“I think you are excessively disagreeable. You know I can’t walk all that way.”
“We can drive some distance.”
“Oh, I daresay! I should have miles to tramp. And I had made up my mind to go to the Ripetta. Mr Penington, do you intend to desert me, also?” What could he say? He said “No,” with a good deal of disappointment in the word. For the last few days it had seemed impossible to get any special sight or hearing of Phillis, and he had made this opportunity with the hope of speaking some words on which it seemed to him that the happiness of his life depended. It was hard to lose it. But Mrs Leyton had no intention of letting him go with them.
“No, I thought not,” she said cheerfully. “And I’m not sure that it isn’t a good plan to separate. One can see things better. We’ll meet by and by, and tell our experiences, if there is anything left of you, after this mad proceeding. But I predict we shall have the best of it.”
“That’s all right, then,” said Captain Leyton cheerfully. “Penington will take you, wife, and we four will start at once. Are you ready, good people?—thick boots, wraps, umbrellas?”
They would not consent so much as to be driven to the Porta del Popolo, and, indeed, the rain was no longer falling with the persistent force of the last few days. The sky was still heavy with leaden-looking clouds, but they were thinner, and in some places so far rent asunder that a glimmering brightness showed behind them. Coming along the Babuino was a picturesque file of donkeys of various ages, led by bronzed men in long blue cloaks; a contadina, also in a blue dress, and a little child, walked by their side. Presently they met other processions; goats, ox-carts piled high with household goods; the poor oxen came stumbling and sliding along over the slippery stones, the people looked dejected, they were straggling in from the campagna, escaping from the threatened inundation. Jack spoke to one woman and asked a question. “Mariaccia, che tempo!” she exclaimed, holding up her hands. “Already much has been swept away. If it goes on, we shall be ruined.” The Via Flaminia was full of these fugitives, but they could not tell them much.
And as yet they saw nothing of the river.