"You were so glad to get back?" remarked the Governor, regarding her closely. "What sort of man was he?" abruptly.
"Old."
"And—"
"That—is all I remember."
"Hum! Not very lucid. No doubt you were too overwrought, my dear, to be in an observant mood." His voice sank absently; his fingers sought among the papers, and, as his glance fell, the girl walked away. Again she leaned on the parapet, and once more regarded the barren waste below—the figures of the cockle-seekers, mere specks, the shadow of the Mount, stamped on the sand, with the saint, a shapeless form, holding up a tapering black line—a sword—at the apex.
"She is keeping back something. What?" Above an official-looking document the Governor watched her, his lips compressed, his eyes keen; then shrugged his shoulders and resumed his occupation. The death-like hush of an aërial region surrounded them; the halcyon peace of a seemingly chimerical cloister; until suddenly broken by an indubitable clangor—harsh, hard!—of a door, opening; shutting. The Governor lifted his head in annoyance; the dove on the roof of the cloister-walk flew away, and a short, fat man, breathing hard, appeared.
"Pardon, your Excellency! But the drafts! They seem sometimes to sweep up from the very dungeons themselves, and—"
"Well?"
Beppo cut short excuse, or explanation. "A prisoner is waiting without. The man, Sanchez, from the shore! Monsieur le Commandant, who brought him, told me to inform you."
The Governor considered a moment with down-bent brows. "You may show him in, but first," he glanced up with a frown, "I have a question to put to you."