He stretched his hands to her, and they stood still for an instant looking into each other’s eyes. The warm sunlight was round them; by their side a man was urging his miserable overladen mule up the Tolentino hill with the long “A-a-a-a-a-o-o!” which had been the cry of his forefathers in the old amphitheatre days. For a moment Peppina let herself go, dizzy with almost intolerable delight, the next a thought stung her, the more sharply for this very delight; she held back from him and cried passionately—
“When did you see the Cianchetti?”
“The Cianchetti!” He was surprised and displeased, so that he flushed under the girl’s piercing look. But he looked back at her. “At her window this morning,” he said unhesitatingly.
“This morning!”
Peppina was pale as death, and trembling all over. Her burning eyes put the question so insistently that he answered as if she had spoken—
“Why do you ask? She is nothing to me.”
The girl told too many lies herself to recognise truth in others. His words brought back the blood from her heart, and to a certain extent relieved her. But she did not quite believe, although she pretended that she did. She was going to strike out at Nina, and say that she had accused him, when she remembered that she had just denied mentioning his name.
“I knew you had seen her. I felt it here,” she answered, pressing her heart. “But of course if you say that—”
“When do they go to Sicily?” he demanded presently, reverting to a more absorbing topic.
“Who knows? They don’t say. It will be in the spring no doubt.”