Again the terrible fear came back to her.
"Signora, it was one morning."
"Used you to bathe in the morning?"
A hot flush came in Gaspare's face, but Hermione did not see it in the darkness.
"Once we did, signora. We had been fishing."
"Go on. Tell me!"
Then Gaspare related the incident of his padrone's sinking in the sea. Only he made Maurice's travesty appear a real catastrophe. Hermione listened with painful attention. So Maurice had nearly died, had been into the jaws of death, while she had been in Africa! Her fears there had been less ill-founded than she had thought. A horror came upon her as she heard Gaspare's story.
"And then, signora, I cried," he ended. "I cried."
"You cried?"
"I thought I never could stop crying again."