She listened; then she turned her bright face towards him, glowing with spirit and brave interest. 'Oh,' she said, 'I know what it is like, for there was a time, one week, when they would not let me speak to my Pio.'
She talked to him now of herself as to an old friend; with the unhesitating frankness of a child; the young man was strangely touched and pleased by her simple confidence.
When the footpath grew narrower she walked on in front of him. She walked well, with an easy carriage; her firm bare ankles gleamed in the moonlight below the hem of her short cotton gown; her loose wooden shoes made a short quick tapping at each step which she took.
The night was very warm and still. On one side of the road the Arno flowed past silently; the pale light in the sky was reflected upon its glassy surface as upon a sheet of metal; it looked like a river of lead. As the moon rose a faint wind stirred softly among the budding branches of the lime-trees which edge the fields, and the delicate shadows of the moving stems fell upon ploughed land. In each isolated farmyard the hay-ricks, cut close for last winter's fodder, assumed a curiously velvety texture as the moonlight rested on their blanched and weather-beaten tops.
As they drew nearer the mouth of the Arno the spreading pines of the Gombo made a dark line against the sky to their right and across the river. The fields grew wider; the night was full of a new sound which was not the sound of the wind. Dino listened more intently; his quick ear could distinguish the muffled beat of the waves upon the sandy shore.
Presently they reached the borders of the wood; the footpath ended; the soil grew sandy underfoot. At the turning of the road there were lights burning in some cottages. The peasant women stopped at the door of one of the houses.
'Good-night,' Isolina called out in her friendly voice; 'good-night again; and thank you for the civil company.'
She disappeared amidst a rapturous chorus of welcome from the farmyard dogs. She had brought to Dino a charmed hour of forgetfulness; he watched her turning away from him with an air of regret.
Later, as they lounged upon the beach, smoking their pipes in the still moonlight, Valdez said, laying his hand affectionately upon Dino's shoulder, 'I liked hearing you laugh with that little girl to-night, my lad. You were such a light-hearted lad in the old days. You're fretting now. Courage! my Dino, courage! There are no depths for a brave heart from which hope cannot mount; hope which outlasts gold and the grave. And, for a man, whatever the consequence of his action may be, even to have meant well, is sufficient excuse in the eyes of the woman who loves him. Excuse? it's a vindication which, nine times out of ten, will make her end by asking him to forgive her suspicion.'
'I know it; but it won't save Italia from suffering,' said Dino quickly.