"Most interesting, but the bass was hoarse!"
It was Polyxena Jatinsky who pronounced this summary criticism of the solemn ceremonial, close to Zinka. Zinka looked round; Sempaly with his aunt and cousins were at her side. They had attended the service in reserved places in the choir. Involuntarily yielding to an impulse of pain Zinka pressed forward, but Gabrielle had flown to join them; then she was obliged to stay and talk. The Jatinskys were perfectly friendly, Polyxena giving her her hand--Sempaly alone held aloof. On going out the air struck' chill, almost cold, on Zinka's face and she shivered. A well-known voice close behind her said rather brusquely:
"You are too lightly dressed and there is fever in the air. Put this round you," and Sempaly threw over her shoulders a scarf that he was carrying for one of the ladies.
"Thank you, I am not cold; these ladies will want the scarf," said Zinka hastily and repellently.
Polyxena said nothing; perhaps she may have thought it strange that in his anxiety for this little stranger, her cousin should forget to consider that one of them might take cold. But Nini exclaimed: "No, no, Fräulein Sterzl: we are well wrapped up."
At this juncture Truyn's servant, who had been seeking them among the crowd, told them where the carriage was waiting.
While Zinka, wrapped in Nini's China-crape shawl, is borne along between the splashing fountains, across the bridge of St. Angelo, and through the empty, ill-lighted streets to the palazetto, all her pulses are dancing and throbbing--and the stars in the sky overhead seem unnaturally bright. It is the resurrection of her pain and with it of the lovely mocking vision of the joys she has lost. Good God! how vividly she remembers them all--how keenly!--the long dreamy afternoons on the Palatine, the delicious hours in the Corsini garden--under the plane-trees by the fountain, where he talked about Erzburg while the perfume of violets and lilies fanned her with their intoxicating breath; the sound of his voice--the touch of his light, thin hand, his smile--his way of saying particular words, of looking at her in particular moments....
She is walking with him once more in the Vatican, in rapt enjoyment of the beauty of the statues; the Belvedere fountain trickled and splashed in dreamy monotony; golden sunbeams fleck the pavement like footmarks left by the Gods before they mounted their pedestals; there is a mysterious rustle and whisper in the lofty corridors as of far, far distant ghostly voices,--and then, suddenly, she is in front of Sant' Onofrio's; the air is thick with a pale mist. At her feet, veiled in the thin haze, indistinct and mirage-like, the very ghost of departed splendor, lies Rome--the vast reliquary of the world; Rome, on whose monuments and ruins every conceivable crime and every imaginable virtue have set their stamp; where the tragedies of antiquity cry out to the Sacrifice on Calvary.
They had stood together a long time looking down on it; then she had lost a little bunch of violets which she had been wearing and as she turned round to seek them she had perceived that he had picked them up and was holding them to his lips. Their eyes had met....
Yes! he had loved her! he loved her still--he must--she knew it. She told herself that, impulsive and excitable as he was, the merest trifle would suffice to bring him back to her; but whether it was worth while to long so desperately for a man who could be turned by the slightest breath--that she did not ask herself.