Hermione drew in.
“There is something disgusting in nature to-night,” she said—“something that seems almost unnatural.”
The blind man began to sing behind them. His voice was soft and throaty. The phrasing was sickly. Some notes trembled. As he sang he threw back his head, stared with his sightless eyes at the ceiling, and showed his tongue. The whole of his fat body swayed. His face became scarlet. The two hopeless, middle-aged men on either side of him stared into vacancy as, with dirty hands on which the veins stood out, they played wrong basses to the melody on their guitars.
Suddenly Hermione was seized with a sensation of fear.
“Let us go. We had better go. Ah!”
She cried out. The wind, returning, had caught the white table-cloth. It flew up towards her, then sank down.
“What a fool I am!” she said. “I thought—I didn’t know—”
She felt that really it was something in Artois which had upset her nerves, but she did not say so. In that moment, when she was startled, she had instinctively put out her hand towards him. But, as instinctively, she drew it back without touching him.
“Oh, here is Gaspare!” she said.
An immense, a really ridiculous sense of relief came to her as she saw Gaspare’s sturdy legs marching decisively towards them, his great eyes examining the row of mirrors, the tables, the musicians, then settling comfortably upon his Padrona. Over his arms he carried the cloaks, and his hands grasped the two umbrellas. At that moment, if she had translated her impulse into an action, Hermione would have given Gaspare a good hug—just for being himself; for being always the same: honest, watchful, perfectly fearless, perfectly natural, and perfectly determined to take care of his Padrona and his Padroncina.