“Of course, when he had fever—”
“No, it wasn’t that. Any one might be ill. I think he has things at home to make him unhappy sometimes.”
“Has he been telling you so?”
“Oh, he doesn’t complain,” Vere said, quickly, and almost with a touch of heat. “A boy like that couldn’t whine, you know, Madre. But one can understand things without hearing them said. There is some trouble. I don’t know what it is exactly. But I think his step-father—his Patrigno, as he calls him—must have got into some bother, or done something horrible. Ruffo seemed to want to tell me, and yet not to want to tell me. And, of course, I couldn’t ask. I think he’ll tell me to-morrow, perhaps.”
“Is he coming here to-morrow?”
“Oh, in summer I think he comes nearly every night.”
“But you haven’t said anything about him just lately.”
“No. Because he hasn’t landed till to-night since the night of the storm.”
“I wonder why?” said Hermione.
She was interested; but she still felt tired, and the fatigue crept into her voice.