"Here we are at Cecchina!" she cried with relief, as she heard the whistle announcing their arrival. "Quick—quick, love, we must get down."
In order to amuse him, she affected gayety. She lowered the window and looked out.
"The evening is cold, but beautiful. Make haste, love. This is our anniversary. We must be happy."
The sound of her strong and tender voice drove away his gloominess. On alighting in the fresh air, he felt himself restored to serenity.
A sky, limpid as a diamond, curved like a vault over the country drenched with water. In the transparent atmosphere there still flitted beams of crepuscular light. The stars came out one by one, as if shaken on the staffs of invisible lamp-bearers.
"We must be happy." George heard internally the echo of Hippolyte's remark; and his soul swelled with indefinite aspirations. On this solemn and pure night the quiet chamber, the flaming hearth, the bed with its white-gauze draperies, appeared to him to be elements too humble for happiness. "It is our anniversary—we must be happy." Of what had he thought—what was he doing, at this same hour two years ago? He had wandered aimlessly through the streets, pressed on by an instinctive desire to seek more deserted spots, yet attracted nevertheless towards the populous quarters, where his pride and joy seemed to grow by contrast with the common life; where the ambient noises of the city sounded in his ears only like a distant murmur.
CHAPTER V.
The old hotel of Ludovico Togni, with the walls of its long vestibule done in stucco and painted to imitate marble, with its landing-places with green doors, decorated all over with commemorative stones, gave an immediate impression of quasi-conventional peace. All the furniture had an aspect of being heirlooms. The beds, the chairs, the sofas, the couches, the chests of drawers, had the style of another age, now fallen into disuse. The delicately colored ceilings, bright yellow and sky-blue, were decorated at their centres with garlands of roses or other usual symbols, such as a lyre, a torch, or a quiver. On the paper-hangings and woollen carpet the bouquets of flowers had faded, and had become almost invisible; the window curtains, white and modest, hung from poles from which the gilt had worn off; the rococo mirrors, while reflecting these antique images in a dull mist, imparted to them that air of melancholy, and almost of unreality, which solitary pools sometimes give at their edges.
"How pleased I am to be here!" cried Hippolyte, penetrated by the charm of this peaceful spot. "I wish I could stay here forever."
And she drew herself up in the great armchair, her head leaning against the back, which was decorated with a crescent, a modest crochet-work in white cotton.