Giles paced up and down his verandah restlessly; he was awaiting Jocelyn’s arrival. His wife had sent an invitation to her and to Mrs. Travis to come and see the villa, with the suggestion that they should afterwards drive on to Bordighera. Nielsen, who had also received an invitation, was coming with them; the prospect of a whole day in Jocelyn’s society having caused him for once to abandon his professional visit to the gambling-tables.
The little grey villa hanging over the Cornice road smiled down a sheer descent at the sea, which danced, far out, to the tune of the breeze in lines of sapphire, and, shorewards, was ringed smoothly with a dull, turquoise crescent of water, broken only where the foam-scud, shining in the brilliant sunshine, flew up over the green-grey rocks. Below the wall, on the nether side of the road, a clump of silver olives swayed gracefully in the freshening breeze, and beyond, a group of stone pines brooded, thoughtful and apart, at the edge of the cliff. Hanging masses of pink geranium, and wine-coloured bougainvillea stained the greyness of the villa walls, and rainbow roses clung in festoons round its closed, green shutters.
Up the curved, white vista of dusty road toiled the figure of an old man, sturdily bending under his load of palm branches. A two-horsed cart rattled noisily downwards towards the bridge to the crack of the driver’s lash and his shrill “yuips.” Just in front of the villa three small brown urchins chattered busily in the dust, heaving flat stones aimlessly along the road; and the soft, metallic note of women’s talk, with a wailing rise at the end of each sentence, floated up from a gaily-skirted group washing linen in the tank below. To the left, where the road wound past a buttress of old grey masonry, palms clustered skyward in dusty profusion; to the right, through a slanting, mauve network of wisteria and sleepy heliotrope, one caught a glimpse of the lichen-dotted wall of a Saracen tower, rising solid and picturesque, pierced in the centre by a white-washed stone archway. The sea gave a blue-green setting to the spreading foliage, to the gnarled trunks of the balancing olives and the stems of the pines; the edging foam, glinting white as it shot up over the rocks, seemed to throw a playful challenge to the friends that had hung so long above in airy seclusion.
In a corner of the garden, where a pepper tree threw feathery shadows from its hanging, frond-like leaves, and dull pink berries, on to the grass, Shikari lay, his head between his paws, watching his master’s restless figure out of one half-closed eye.
Presently the sound of wheels was heard coming up the road. Giles stopped his uneasy tramp on the broad verandah, and, followed by the dog, went and stood at the top of the crescent of trellis-roofed steps, that led curving up to the door from the outside porch. The carriage stopped. Jocelyn was the first to alight. She stood, for a minute, before she mounted, looking up at him through the roses which trailed mysteriously over her head out of shadowy masses of hanging foliage—falling through the openings of the twisted trellis-work, they seemed to be whispering and beckoning to her, as she stood under the green archway.
Shikari walked gravely down the steps, and raising himself, placed a paw on each of her shoulders.
Irma was waiting for them in a cool room on the ground floor. She looked very ill, but she greeted her visitors with graceful cordiality. Giles noticed that she looked at Jocelyn with a strangely wistful expression. Nielsen, who had followed them into the room, suddenly produced from his pocket a beautiful little china bowl, which he presented to his hostess with his usual elaborate languor.
“I have been waiting for the chance of giving you this, my dear lady,” he said, bowing. “It was presented to me by my dear frriend Dick Garron; it comes from Yokohama, you know; I have been tortured,” and he spread his hands expressively, “for fear it should be destrroyed by my cats. I should not feel it so deeply, don’t you see, if it were destrroyed by other people’s cats.”
Irma’s tired face, yellow-white from constant pain, lighted up with a smile. Jocelyn had brought her flowers, Mrs. Travis, chocolate; the three characteristic gifts touched her fancy humorously. As she murmured her gracious, foreign thanks, her eyes—like those of a souled monkey—kept glancing from Jocelyn as she put the flowers in water, to Giles, who leant against the door watching her. He caught one look from his wife; there was such sadness, such depth of comprehension, such mockery in it, that he knew once for all there was nothing to hide from her. He dropped his eyes, and there was a moment when his feelings were a strange mingling of shame, regret, bitterness, and compassion—a moment of absolute physical discomfort; then he stepped across, smoothed her cushions, and with a muttered excuse left the room.
Nielsen, an old friend with a great and sympathetic admiration for the sick woman, had much to say, and proceeded to say it. Mrs. Travis was busy inspecting the silver in two cabinets against the wall, examining the pattern critically, and murmuring a constant approval. Jocelyn, left to herself, talked to two bullfinches, who instantly became her friends. Her nerves were on edge, the strain of the situation, whether she would or no, was being forced upon her reason. Her aunt’s complacent comments, Nielsen’s languid chatter, Irma’s eyes so full of meaning and knowledge, and yet so kind, jarred her. The colour came and went in her face, and her eyes looked restlessly about her; she revolted impatiently in a hardly-repressed irritation against the confinement of the pretty, dainty room, shaded by the verandahs from the powerful beat and throb of life outside. She longed to get into the sunshine, away from the thoughts that crowded painfully upon her mind.