The word "devil" caused the bishop to wake up from his pleasant dreams with something of a start.
"You had better take a good look at that cliff," suggested Mr. Keith. "It is not only the finest on the island but, I fancy, the finest on the whole Mediterranean. Those on the Spanish coast and on Mount Athos lack the wonderful colour and the clean surface of this one. Looks as if it had been done with a knife, doesn't it? Alpine crags seem vertical but are nearly always inclined; their primary rock, you know, cannot flake off abruptly like this tufa. This is a genuine precipice. Plumb!"
"Terrific," said Mr. Heard. "What was that about the English lord?"
"Two young fellows who rented the villa at the back of it for a summer. They used to bathe and booze all day long. I was not on the island at the time, but of course I heard about it. One day the younger one jumped over the edge of the cliff for a bet; said he was going to dive. They never recovered his body. There is a strong current at this point. That's so, isn't it, Antonio?"
"That so, gentlemens. Drink branty all the time, both of them. But little one—everybody smile at him. Pretty boy. Swim and dive, something lovely. One evening both get drunk and walk along the edge of cliff up there. Then little one, he say: I good diver, eh, what, friend? Big one say: You dive prettier than dolphin.—What bet, over cliff here, now?—Six bottle branty.—Done! Clothes off, over he go, like a sea-bird. All finished. That so, gentlemens. Next morning they bring clothes to big one into house. Big one, when he wake up and see clothes lying there, with no friend inside, he very angry with servants and everybody else, and drink no more branty for three days. Dam-fool foreigners."
"That's a tragedy, anyhow," said the bishop.
"You are right. It is quite artistic—that touch about bringing back the clothes, the empty shell, next morning. Quite artistic."
Mr. Heard looked up at the crag. It made him dizzy to picture some human body hurtling through the air from that awful height. Its surface was of perfect smoothness. But what struck him even more was the uncommon and almost menacing coloration. The rock was bluish black, spattered with maculations of a ruddy sanguine tint, as though drops of blood had oozed out, in places, from its stony heart.
"I remember Mrs. Meadows telling me that story," he said to Keith.
"Isn't her villa at the back?"
"The very place. By the way, when next you call, would you please say something particularly nice DE MA PART? I don't see half enough of that lady, considering how much I like her. How is she?"