Philip Carey allowed the tempest of grief to exhaust itself; then he said to her, in a grave and very sweet voice, yet a little sternly,—
“My poor little girl, you were ready to take a great crime on your little white soul to-night; and who knows where its evil might have stopped? Fire is not a plaything. Now, I want you to listen to what I have to say about myself. I am a magistrate, and I was on the bench to-day, it is true. But I did not approve of the sentence passed on you by men of greater age and weight in the county than I am, and I tried my best, vainly, to have it mitigated. I had nothing whatever to do with your grandfather’s arrest. What he did, harmless though it seems, was yet against the law; and the mayor of the town chose to enforce the law against him. More than this, my dear, not only would I not, had I been alone, have sentenced your grandfather in so severe a manner, but I would have aided you all to return to your own country. As it is, I mean to-morrow to use what influence I possess to endeavor to obtain a remission of your grandfather’s sentence, and I meant also to go across to Portsmouth and see the Italian consul there, to ascertain whether or not he could not help you to go back to Naples if I could succeed in getting your punishments remitted, as I hoped to do.”
He paused, and Gemma gazed at him with dilated eyes and a hot color on her cheeks. She was silent and ashamed.
“Now you have spoiled it all,” continued Mr. Carey: “how can I beg for a little incendiary to be let loose on the world? And my gardener will see those lucifer matches in the morning, and every one will know or guess then what you came to do, and why my dog Monarch sprang on you.”
The color went out of her face, and her lips quivered.
“But it was only me,” she said, piteously. “Nonno would not have tried to fire your house, nor Bindo. It was only me. Could you not punish me all by myself and let them out? If you will only let them out, I will go back to prison, and I will not run away again: I will bear it all my life if I must, if you will only let out Nonno and Bindo!”
“My dear,” answered Philip Carey, “I have no power: I cannot deal you out life and death, as you seem to think. You are a dangerous and fierce little tigress, of that there is no doubt; but I do not think the reformatory, good as it is, would improve you much. Suppose we make a bargain: if you will promise me to try and be good, I will promise you to try and liberate you all three, and send you all back in a good ship to your own country.”
With as much rapidity as she had sprung up on his saddle to box his ears, Gemma sprang off the couch, and, to his great amazement, threw her arms about his neck and kissed him.
“Oh, you are good!” she murmured, rapturously. “I love you, I love you, I love you as much as I hated you yesterday!”
And she was so pretty that Philip Carey could not be angry with her any more.