“I was,” said Nadia, in the same hard voice. “You told me that I had been doing wrong the night I came to Pavelsburg, and now this has happened to make me sure of it. It is all through me. Don’t speak to me, Marraine. No doubt it is well that I should see what harm my wanting my own way can do. But why should he be punished for what was my fault?”
She stood looking away through the trees with stony eyes that saw nothing, and the Princess laid her hand on her arm and guided her gently back to the carriage. When they reached it, Alessandro came bustling up to express a hope that the telegram had not contained any bad news, but Nadia neither saw nor heard him. As they left the gardens behind them, she sat looking out over the arid landscape, refusing to listen to the Princess’s attempts to comfort her.
“Please don’t speak to me just now, Marraine. Let me get used to the thought,” she said at last, and her godmother desisted with a sigh from her well-meant efforts. They had passed Città Vecchia before the Princess spoke again; and this time she did not address Nadia, but seeing two weary-looking men toiling along the road a short distance in front of the carriage, she called to Alessandro, who was riding behind—
“Tell the driver to stop when we come up to those men, Alessandro. They look tired, and we might drive them into Valetta.”
Alessandro obeyed in silence, for he was becoming accustomed to his mistress’s eccentricities, but with a slight grimace.
“Vill your ’ighness zat I speak to zem?” he asked, as the carriage stopped.
“No,” said the Princess, “I will invite them myself. This one does not look like a Maltese. I will try him in English. My poor man, I fear you are in some distress. Can we help you in any way?”
The second wayfarer, a Maltese peasant in the ordinary dusty cotton clothes and Phrygian cap, stared in surprise and utter lack of comprehension at the lady; but the one whom the Princess had addressed came forward respectfully, touching the place where the brim of his hat would naturally have been, if he had worn one. He was an undersized, light-haired man, haggard and unshaven, and clad in what looked like the tattered remains of a suit of livery of some kind.
“I’m sure you’re very good, ma’am,” he said. “If you would be so kind as tell me the word for ‘doctor’ in this chap’s lingo, and ’ow to find one in the town yonder when we gets to it, me and my master would be no end obliged to you.”
“Your master is ill—hurt?” asked the Princess. “You have been shipwrecked with him, perhaps?”