Perhaps Cesare had not heard her last words. His worn and eager eyes looked out over the almond-trees to where dark Etna lay stretched along the land. There were things he saw in the night of which he never spoke to Peppina; often a haunting girl’s face changing from laughter into sudden terrible reproach. He did not regret his deed. He looked upon himself as a righteous executioner despising ordered law, and believing that he and others of his own way of thinking were bound to execute judgment where it was called for. But his belief did not shut out the face, and he had now a curious thought that any other eyes looking out of the darkness would be more bearable than hers, so long—so long as they were not a woman’s.
Chapter Fifteen.
One day, two days, passed. Mrs Brodrick and Teresa felt like conspirators watching for a sign. As they did not get one, the telling Sylvia on the appointed day grew more disquieting in prospect. Evidently she was not quick enough to read faces, or she must have discovered for herself that something was wrong, that Wilbraham was gloomy, Teresa angry, and her grandmother uneasy. On Tuesday they were to go to Syracuse.
“And we shall see him depart in another direction,” said Teresa with decision.
“If,” said her grandmother—“if all this had never happened, do you believe you might some day have liked him?”
The question had been on her lips more than once. The young marchesa hesitated.
“Perhaps,” she answered frankly. “Perhaps—I don’t know. I liked him better at Assisi.”
“He has been a fool,” thought Mrs Brodrick, turning away.