"You are come to fetch your handkerchief," he said. "You need not have taken that trouble. In the morning I would have asked Giuseppe to take it to you."
"It is not the handkerchief," she said quickly. "I have been up among the hills to gather herbs to stop the blood; see here." And she lifted the lid of her little basket.
"Too much trouble," he said, not in bitterness—"far too much trouble.
I am better, much better; but if I were worse, it would be no more than
I deserve. Why did you come at such a time? If any one should see you?
You know how they talk, even when they don't know what they are saying."
"I care for no one's talk," she said, passionately. "I came to see your hand, and put the herbs upon it; you cannot do it with your left."
"It is not worth while, I tell you."
"Let me see it then, if I am to believe you."
She took his hand, that was not able to prevent her, and unbound the linen. When she saw the swelling, she shuddered, and gave a cry: "Jesus Maria!"
"It is a little swollen," he said; "it will be over in four-and-twenty hours."
She shook her head. "It will certainly be a week before you can go to sea."
"More likely a day or two; and if not, what matters?"