Chapter Fifteen.One day, two days, passed. Mrs Brodrick and Teresa felt like conspirators watching for a sign. As they did not get one, the telling Sylvia on the appointed day grew more disquieting in prospect. Evidently she was not quick enough to read faces, or she must have discovered for herself that something was wrong, that Wilbraham was gloomy, Teresa angry, and her grandmother uneasy. On Tuesday they were to go to Syracuse.“And we shall see him depart in another direction,” said Teresa with decision.“If,” said her grandmother—“if all this had never happened, do you believe you might some day have liked him?”The question had been on her lips more than once. The young marchesa hesitated.“Perhaps,” she answered frankly. “Perhaps—I don’t know. I liked him better at Assisi.”“He has been a fool,” thought Mrs Brodrick, turning away.At this moment Sylvia came hurriedly into the room.“Is Mary here?” she asked.“No; she is watching Peppina pack. Where are you going?”Teresa with a heavy heart tried to speak playfully, and failed.“Past the cemetery, and down towards the sea.”“Ah, I never get you to myself nowadays.”“But you know I love you, don’t you, Teresa?” said the girl anxiously.“My dear!” cried the marchesa, still with a poor pretence at gaiety. She looked at her grandmother.“Must you go? Or can you first come to my room for half an hour?” asked Mrs Brodrick in a voice a little tremulous, and with lines showing suddenly in her face.“Oh, I can’t, granny, I can’t now,” Sylvia returned; “Walter is waiting for me. When I come back I shall have plenty of time. Oh, please!”“Well, go then,” said Mrs Brodrick with a sigh.Sylvia went down the long room, putting one or two things in tidy order as she passed. Wilbraham was waiting for her in the little look-out place behind the hotel. The ground, dotted with great prickly-pear clumps, fell very steeply towards the water, and folds of blue hills stretched from Monte Venere towards Messina. Across a radiant sea, snow gleamed on Aspromonte. Two fishermen were coming up a narrow pathway.“Where are we going? By the cemetery?” asked Sylvia.Wilbraham roused himself with a start.“That’s as good a way as any—and the end of all things,” he muttered under his breath, so that she did not hear. “But if she had heard,” he reflected bitterly, “she would not have understood.” He scarcely now took the trouble to conceal things from her, always feeling secure that she would not understand.They went away together down stony tracks. The gate of the little burying-place was open; they could see its great bushes of scarlet geranium, and yellow daisies, and ugly staring tombs lying in sunshine. Sylvia wondered a great deal, as usual, whether people lived a long time at Taormina, whether there was a doctor, whether the children went to school. To all, Wilbraham answered impatiently that he did not know.Every now and then, however, she was silent, which was unusual, but struck him as a relief.They skirted the wall, fennel towering high on the other side, and turned into a small steep path running down through flowery banks and fields, sheeted with red and blue vetches.“How funny it is to have fields like these!”Sylvia’s remarks were above all things wanting in suggestiveness. Answers did not spring from them, but had to begin an altogether separate existence.“Are you tired?” asked Wilbraham, “or shall we go down to the shore? I think you wanted to see the caves?”“I wanted so much to see a flying-fish. I think it must look so odd, don’t you? But then, of course, if we went, we might not see one. Shall we sit on this bank?”“If you like.”“And talk?”“That too—if you like.”“I wanted to say something.”He bit his lip, used to Sylvia’s utterances.“Well, my dear child, I’m listening.”He was not thinking of her. His mind had shot away to Teresa, Teresa with an angry light in her eyes, for which he loved her the more. Hopeless, he would not have had her different; but different—to him—what might she not have been! Suddenly, unexpectedly, a word of Sylvia’s caught his attention.“I don’t think that people ought to marry unless they love each other. Every one always says they ought not,” she was remarking in a nervously excited voice. “I think we had better give it up.”“Give it up? Do you mean break off our engagement?” he faltered. “Sylvia!”She was twisting a few blades of grass into a plait, and looking down at that. But his words evidently distressed her.“Oh, don’t you think we had better?” she exclaimed, with the appeal of a child.He had been conscious of so exquisite a relief that his honour took alarm.“Why?” he said, leaning forward. “What is your reason?”She looked up at him, evidently troubled; the prettiness of her face pathetically touched with the quite new struggle to explain a feeling.“Don’t you know what I mean? I can’t say it exactly, Walter. I thought you would be sure to understand. Don’t you know? People must beveryfond of each other, mustn’t they?”All the better part of him was quickened by a perception of her sweetness and humility. But the devil set him answering with conscious untruth, and almost roughness—“So, Sylvia, you’ve never cared for me!”Her distress shamed him.“I did, I did, you know I did, Walter! Of course I did. And I have been so happy! Oh, please, don’t say you don’t think so. What can I say, what can I do, to make you know?Doknow,dounderstand.”All her body was working with quick excited movements, all her heart was in her eyes. Wilbraham covered his own.“God forgive me, you poor little girl!” he groaned brokenly.“Ah! then you do know,” she said in a voice that was almost pleased. A little pride in her rose up, because she had been able to convince him, for generally she never attempted to argue, accepting dutifully whatever view of the situation he or Teresa took. This time it was she herself who had made the impression. She put her hand into his.“Oh, don’t be sorry,” she said consolingly.“But if you—if you love me?”“Still, we’ve both got to do it, haven’t we?” she said, and looked at him doubtfully. Was she perhaps mistaken after all? Walter had believed her when she reassured him, and so—if he were to say the same to her, well, then certainly she must believe him, too. And how glad she would be! How very very glad! She looked at him again. He was sorry, not pleased.“Walter?” She hesitated.“Yes, Sylvia?”“Will you tell me?”“What?”“If I am right. I want to do what’s right, but it’s so funny, it doesn’t seem to be quite easy. I thought one always knew.”She sighed—an odd disjointed little sigh, and any sigh was so unlike Sylvia, that Wilbraham cursed himself again. But what a question she was putting.“How can I help you? Ask your own heart.”Always literal, she tried to obey him, but in a few minutes turned a puzzled face.“I don’t think I know how to do it. My heart doesn’t say anything different—at least,Idon’t say anything, if that’s the same thing? It is, isn’t it? It’s you that must tell me.”“I’ll make you happy. I swear I will!”And he meant it.“Yes,” said the girl, speaking more slowly than was usual with her. “Oh, I should be happy, of course.”“Well, then?”“But that isn’t it, is it? It isn’t my being happy—I wish you could help me,” she added, twisting her fingers nervously, and frowning—“I wish you could tell me.”He started up, then flung himself down by her side, burying his face.“For God’s sake, Sylvia, what do you want me to say?”“Why, what you would like, of course,” she returned simply. “We ought both of us to love each other, oughtn’t we?”He made a slight movement of his head.“One—isn’t enough?”Silence. But Sylvia must always have an answer.“Is it, Walter?”He twisted himself.“Oh, I don’t know.”“Why, you know everything,” she said proudly. “Of course you know. And please tell me, because I get so puzzled when I have to settle things for myself—”Suddenly he caught her hands.“You told no one what you were going to say to me?”“There was no one I could quite ask,” she replied drearily. “I thought granny would be too old.”Teresa’s name she did not mention. Why not? he wondered guiltily.“And so it is you who must tell me. Have you forgotten what it is?”“No, I haven’t forgotten,” he stammered, hot with shame. “If I don’t love you as much as I should, Sylvia, I—I think we should get along all right. I’d do my best.”“Oh! of course you would.” She looked away. “I suppose people can’t always help making those mistakes, can they? How funny it is they should!”She sighed, trying to smile.“And there is something else to ask you.”He felt as if another of these problems would drive him mad.“What shall I call you now?” said Sylvia, staring at him. “I suppose I mustn’t say Walter, and Mr Wilbraham sounds so odd!”The pathos and the pettiness of it! The little mind casting about for props, and following so faithfully where those she had guided her!“Sylvia,” he blurted out, “I’ve been a brute—try me once more, dear. I’ll do better, I swear it.”She shook her head, smiling sadly.“You see, I’m not clever like Teresa; but I am quite sure no two people ought to marry unless they love each other very much. I thought you meant you did, and so I don’t suppose I asked you questions enough. Then we might have found out, of course; but I didn’t. We needn’t say any more about it, need we?”“I’ll rid you of my company to-morrow.”“Won’t you come to Syracuse? Oh, but you wanted to see something there, didn’t you? It seems such a pity you should not see it! If you come, I shan’t tease you, indeed. Granny will be very glad to have me to walk with her. And if once or twice I do forget and call you Walter, I hope you won’t mind much?”“My God, Sylvia,” he cried, “you punish me!”“Punish you! Oh!” she exclaimed in distress—“but haven’t I explained rightly? I thought we should all be just as we were before Assisi. You used to walk about with us then, don’t you know, and I don’t see why this should make any difference.” She stood up. “Shall we go back, or did you want to go on farther?”Go on! He had a revulsion of feeling which swept remorse into the background. If she could say all this—if there was no more than a bare surface an inch deep to be stirred, he need not scourge himself with having troubled it for a few weeks. She could suggest his remaining with them, could bear to see him day by day, could ask at this moment whether he would not like to walk farther! This was not love. To lose this could cost nothing. She was a little pale—that was all.“I think we had better go back,” he said in a cold voice.As they clambered up the steep flowery path—Sylvia in her pretty pale green frock, chosen carefully by Teresa, looking the very creature to be moving through this flower-laden earth—he was already feeling a breezy exultation, a sense of freedom, which sent the blood coursing joyfully. And gradually, as this possessed him, other possibilities rushed into his vision. Surely Teresa would see for herself, would understand, that he was not so much to blame? She, if any one, must be aware of Sylvia’s shallowness, must recognise that a man could not be content to pass through life with no other companion, would excuse, forgive—ah, if he could but make her love him, how much would not she forgive?And poor Sylvia—already forgotten, because she had not the power of impressing her little individuality—stumbled in front, while he walked on air behind. She was so unhappy that now and then she could not see the path for tears which blurred her eyes; but her only fear was lest Wilbraham might find them out and blame himself. There was something heroic—or, if you will, true womanly—about the simple, unaffected manner in which she had done what she had determined ought to be done. She threw no thought at her own wrongs; cast no reproach at Wilbraham; did not look forward or shudder at the picture of dull grey days, such as have been known to drive women to despair; did not exaggerate her sorrows.And so, perhaps, even in hearing her story, there are few who will pity her.They had met no one, and had only noticed a few peasants working in the fields; yet, as they again passed the cemetery gate, a man was walking not far behind. A labourer, gnawing a root of fennel, paused as he saw him, and made a movement of his head.“That way,” he said significantly.“I know,” returned the man, without quickening his steps.
One day, two days, passed. Mrs Brodrick and Teresa felt like conspirators watching for a sign. As they did not get one, the telling Sylvia on the appointed day grew more disquieting in prospect. Evidently she was not quick enough to read faces, or she must have discovered for herself that something was wrong, that Wilbraham was gloomy, Teresa angry, and her grandmother uneasy. On Tuesday they were to go to Syracuse.
“And we shall see him depart in another direction,” said Teresa with decision.
“If,” said her grandmother—“if all this had never happened, do you believe you might some day have liked him?”
The question had been on her lips more than once. The young marchesa hesitated.
“Perhaps,” she answered frankly. “Perhaps—I don’t know. I liked him better at Assisi.”
“He has been a fool,” thought Mrs Brodrick, turning away.
At this moment Sylvia came hurriedly into the room.
“Is Mary here?” she asked.
“No; she is watching Peppina pack. Where are you going?”
Teresa with a heavy heart tried to speak playfully, and failed.
“Past the cemetery, and down towards the sea.”
“Ah, I never get you to myself nowadays.”
“But you know I love you, don’t you, Teresa?” said the girl anxiously.
“My dear!” cried the marchesa, still with a poor pretence at gaiety. She looked at her grandmother.
“Must you go? Or can you first come to my room for half an hour?” asked Mrs Brodrick in a voice a little tremulous, and with lines showing suddenly in her face.
“Oh, I can’t, granny, I can’t now,” Sylvia returned; “Walter is waiting for me. When I come back I shall have plenty of time. Oh, please!”
“Well, go then,” said Mrs Brodrick with a sigh.
Sylvia went down the long room, putting one or two things in tidy order as she passed. Wilbraham was waiting for her in the little look-out place behind the hotel. The ground, dotted with great prickly-pear clumps, fell very steeply towards the water, and folds of blue hills stretched from Monte Venere towards Messina. Across a radiant sea, snow gleamed on Aspromonte. Two fishermen were coming up a narrow pathway.
“Where are we going? By the cemetery?” asked Sylvia.
Wilbraham roused himself with a start.
“That’s as good a way as any—and the end of all things,” he muttered under his breath, so that she did not hear. “But if she had heard,” he reflected bitterly, “she would not have understood.” He scarcely now took the trouble to conceal things from her, always feeling secure that she would not understand.
They went away together down stony tracks. The gate of the little burying-place was open; they could see its great bushes of scarlet geranium, and yellow daisies, and ugly staring tombs lying in sunshine. Sylvia wondered a great deal, as usual, whether people lived a long time at Taormina, whether there was a doctor, whether the children went to school. To all, Wilbraham answered impatiently that he did not know.
Every now and then, however, she was silent, which was unusual, but struck him as a relief.
They skirted the wall, fennel towering high on the other side, and turned into a small steep path running down through flowery banks and fields, sheeted with red and blue vetches.
“How funny it is to have fields like these!”
Sylvia’s remarks were above all things wanting in suggestiveness. Answers did not spring from them, but had to begin an altogether separate existence.
“Are you tired?” asked Wilbraham, “or shall we go down to the shore? I think you wanted to see the caves?”
“I wanted so much to see a flying-fish. I think it must look so odd, don’t you? But then, of course, if we went, we might not see one. Shall we sit on this bank?”
“If you like.”
“And talk?”
“That too—if you like.”
“I wanted to say something.”
He bit his lip, used to Sylvia’s utterances.
“Well, my dear child, I’m listening.”
He was not thinking of her. His mind had shot away to Teresa, Teresa with an angry light in her eyes, for which he loved her the more. Hopeless, he would not have had her different; but different—to him—what might she not have been! Suddenly, unexpectedly, a word of Sylvia’s caught his attention.
“I don’t think that people ought to marry unless they love each other. Every one always says they ought not,” she was remarking in a nervously excited voice. “I think we had better give it up.”
“Give it up? Do you mean break off our engagement?” he faltered. “Sylvia!”
She was twisting a few blades of grass into a plait, and looking down at that. But his words evidently distressed her.
“Oh, don’t you think we had better?” she exclaimed, with the appeal of a child.
He had been conscious of so exquisite a relief that his honour took alarm.
“Why?” he said, leaning forward. “What is your reason?”
She looked up at him, evidently troubled; the prettiness of her face pathetically touched with the quite new struggle to explain a feeling.
“Don’t you know what I mean? I can’t say it exactly, Walter. I thought you would be sure to understand. Don’t you know? People must beveryfond of each other, mustn’t they?”
All the better part of him was quickened by a perception of her sweetness and humility. But the devil set him answering with conscious untruth, and almost roughness—
“So, Sylvia, you’ve never cared for me!”
Her distress shamed him.
“I did, I did, you know I did, Walter! Of course I did. And I have been so happy! Oh, please, don’t say you don’t think so. What can I say, what can I do, to make you know?Doknow,dounderstand.”
All her body was working with quick excited movements, all her heart was in her eyes. Wilbraham covered his own.
“God forgive me, you poor little girl!” he groaned brokenly.
“Ah! then you do know,” she said in a voice that was almost pleased. A little pride in her rose up, because she had been able to convince him, for generally she never attempted to argue, accepting dutifully whatever view of the situation he or Teresa took. This time it was she herself who had made the impression. She put her hand into his.
“Oh, don’t be sorry,” she said consolingly.
“But if you—if you love me?”
“Still, we’ve both got to do it, haven’t we?” she said, and looked at him doubtfully. Was she perhaps mistaken after all? Walter had believed her when she reassured him, and so—if he were to say the same to her, well, then certainly she must believe him, too. And how glad she would be! How very very glad! She looked at him again. He was sorry, not pleased.
“Walter?” She hesitated.
“Yes, Sylvia?”
“Will you tell me?”
“What?”
“If I am right. I want to do what’s right, but it’s so funny, it doesn’t seem to be quite easy. I thought one always knew.”
She sighed—an odd disjointed little sigh, and any sigh was so unlike Sylvia, that Wilbraham cursed himself again. But what a question she was putting.
“How can I help you? Ask your own heart.”
Always literal, she tried to obey him, but in a few minutes turned a puzzled face.
“I don’t think I know how to do it. My heart doesn’t say anything different—at least,Idon’t say anything, if that’s the same thing? It is, isn’t it? It’s you that must tell me.”
“I’ll make you happy. I swear I will!”
And he meant it.
“Yes,” said the girl, speaking more slowly than was usual with her. “Oh, I should be happy, of course.”
“Well, then?”
“But that isn’t it, is it? It isn’t my being happy—I wish you could help me,” she added, twisting her fingers nervously, and frowning—“I wish you could tell me.”
He started up, then flung himself down by her side, burying his face.
“For God’s sake, Sylvia, what do you want me to say?”
“Why, what you would like, of course,” she returned simply. “We ought both of us to love each other, oughtn’t we?”
He made a slight movement of his head.
“One—isn’t enough?”
Silence. But Sylvia must always have an answer.
“Is it, Walter?”
He twisted himself.
“Oh, I don’t know.”
“Why, you know everything,” she said proudly. “Of course you know. And please tell me, because I get so puzzled when I have to settle things for myself—”
Suddenly he caught her hands.
“You told no one what you were going to say to me?”
“There was no one I could quite ask,” she replied drearily. “I thought granny would be too old.”
Teresa’s name she did not mention. Why not? he wondered guiltily.
“And so it is you who must tell me. Have you forgotten what it is?”
“No, I haven’t forgotten,” he stammered, hot with shame. “If I don’t love you as much as I should, Sylvia, I—I think we should get along all right. I’d do my best.”
“Oh! of course you would.” She looked away. “I suppose people can’t always help making those mistakes, can they? How funny it is they should!”
She sighed, trying to smile.
“And there is something else to ask you.”
He felt as if another of these problems would drive him mad.
“What shall I call you now?” said Sylvia, staring at him. “I suppose I mustn’t say Walter, and Mr Wilbraham sounds so odd!”
The pathos and the pettiness of it! The little mind casting about for props, and following so faithfully where those she had guided her!
“Sylvia,” he blurted out, “I’ve been a brute—try me once more, dear. I’ll do better, I swear it.”
She shook her head, smiling sadly.
“You see, I’m not clever like Teresa; but I am quite sure no two people ought to marry unless they love each other very much. I thought you meant you did, and so I don’t suppose I asked you questions enough. Then we might have found out, of course; but I didn’t. We needn’t say any more about it, need we?”
“I’ll rid you of my company to-morrow.”
“Won’t you come to Syracuse? Oh, but you wanted to see something there, didn’t you? It seems such a pity you should not see it! If you come, I shan’t tease you, indeed. Granny will be very glad to have me to walk with her. And if once or twice I do forget and call you Walter, I hope you won’t mind much?”
“My God, Sylvia,” he cried, “you punish me!”
“Punish you! Oh!” she exclaimed in distress—“but haven’t I explained rightly? I thought we should all be just as we were before Assisi. You used to walk about with us then, don’t you know, and I don’t see why this should make any difference.” She stood up. “Shall we go back, or did you want to go on farther?”
Go on! He had a revulsion of feeling which swept remorse into the background. If she could say all this—if there was no more than a bare surface an inch deep to be stirred, he need not scourge himself with having troubled it for a few weeks. She could suggest his remaining with them, could bear to see him day by day, could ask at this moment whether he would not like to walk farther! This was not love. To lose this could cost nothing. She was a little pale—that was all.
“I think we had better go back,” he said in a cold voice.
As they clambered up the steep flowery path—Sylvia in her pretty pale green frock, chosen carefully by Teresa, looking the very creature to be moving through this flower-laden earth—he was already feeling a breezy exultation, a sense of freedom, which sent the blood coursing joyfully. And gradually, as this possessed him, other possibilities rushed into his vision. Surely Teresa would see for herself, would understand, that he was not so much to blame? She, if any one, must be aware of Sylvia’s shallowness, must recognise that a man could not be content to pass through life with no other companion, would excuse, forgive—ah, if he could but make her love him, how much would not she forgive?
And poor Sylvia—already forgotten, because she had not the power of impressing her little individuality—stumbled in front, while he walked on air behind. She was so unhappy that now and then she could not see the path for tears which blurred her eyes; but her only fear was lest Wilbraham might find them out and blame himself. There was something heroic—or, if you will, true womanly—about the simple, unaffected manner in which she had done what she had determined ought to be done. She threw no thought at her own wrongs; cast no reproach at Wilbraham; did not look forward or shudder at the picture of dull grey days, such as have been known to drive women to despair; did not exaggerate her sorrows.
And so, perhaps, even in hearing her story, there are few who will pity her.
They had met no one, and had only noticed a few peasants working in the fields; yet, as they again passed the cemetery gate, a man was walking not far behind. A labourer, gnawing a root of fennel, paused as he saw him, and made a movement of his head.
“That way,” he said significantly.
“I know,” returned the man, without quickening his steps.
Chapter Sixteen.Teresa was in her room—the room the sisters shared—when Sylvia came in. The girl’s steps dragged with a suggestion of weariness, but she was smiling, and gave Teresa no impression of anything serious or sad having touched her life.“Where is Nina?” she asked.“Nina is going about singing mournfully—“Venerdi e dì di Marte Non si sposa, e non si parte.“We shall break Nina’s heart with all the bad luck we set to work to bring down on our devoted heads. To-morrow is Tuesday, and we travel.”“Must we?” said Sylvia uneasily.“Oh, baby!” She kissed her. “Well, I’m glad you’re at home. I believe there’s a thunderstorm on the way. Look at Etna.”Clouds—dark, splendid clouds—were rolling up behind the great mountain. The light seemed suddenly to die out of the room.“I hope it won’t come in the night,” said the girl. “Do you think it will? Of course, you don’t know; but I do think one sees it more in the dark.”Teresa’s thoughts were not with the storm. They tenderly wrapped Sylvia, wondering how deep the pain would go.“Darling, didn’t granny say she wanted you? Perhaps you’d better go to her; and then, then, mind you come back to me. To me,” she repeated tenderly.“There’ll be time before dinner,” Sylvia objected without moving.“She’s waiting, dear.”“I’d rather talk to you, Teresa, please. There’s something I want to say. And it’s all so funny!” she went on, breaking into a nervous laugh.The laugh reassured Teresa. The first words had sent the blood back to her heart.“I’m listening,” she said gaily. “I hope it’s very, very funny.”“Well, it is. At least I suppose most people would think so. Oh yes, it’s funny, of course. Teresa, you will marry him, won’t you?”The marchesa turned a whitely-amazed face to her sister.“I? Marry! Who—what?”“Walter. Oh, I shall be able to call him Walter then, of course,” said Sylvia, laughing again and nodding. And suddenly the laugh frightened Teresa. She laid her two hands on the girl’s shoulders and looked into her eyes.“Don’t laugh, please, dear,” she said gravely; “but tell me what you have in your mind. Has Walter said anything to you?”“Itold him,” Sylvia answered proudly.“What?”“That we ought not to marry unless we both loved each other. You know, Teresa, that is quite right; and you know, too, that he isn’t fond of me any more, so, of course, we couldn’t. He thought we could. He thought perhaps it would do if I was happy; but I was sure I ought to say no. And so—” she drew a long breath—“I said it.”“Ah, my poor dear!” cried Teresa, pulling down the pretty head upon her shoulder, and kissing her again. For the moment she had forgotten Sylvia’s first question, and it was the girl herself who reminded her.“So now you will marry him, won’t you?”Teresa had to keep check on herself, for she saw that Sylvia was in a state of tremulous excitement, and that she must speak very quietly, though inwardly fuming.“What has put such a thing into your head—such an amazing thing? What could make you imagine that, under any possibility, I could marry Walter Wilbraham?”“Because he likesyou,” said Sylvia simply.“Likes me? Likes everybody, I suppose!”—scornfully.“Not me. If he did, of course we should be married. Now it will be much better that he should marry you.”Teresa felt sick with the difficulty of convincing, and the remembrance of Wilbraham’s look. Sylvia’s ideas came but rarely, but once come it was next to impossible to dislodge them. She lifted the girl’s chin, and looked steadily into her eyes while she spoke.“Listen, dear,” she said slowly. “I want you to understand very clearly. You have made a great mistake. He is nothing to me, nothing, nothing—he never can be anything.”“He likes you,” repeated Sylvia obstinately.“Don’t say such horrid things!” Teresa cried more hotly.“And I should like him to have what he wants. I shall be so sorry if he goes away to-morrow.”“Of course he must go.”“Why?”“Sylvia, I could shake you! Because if he is to be nothing to you, nobody else wants him.”Sylvia stood staring out at the gathering clouds.“Oh, but I want him,” she said at last.“Dear! Why? How can you?”“Of course I want him to be happy. When you are fond of any one—”Teresa stared at her. What could she say? She saw that the girl was over-strained—nervous; but this firm grasp of the one point she had seized was not to be loosened.“Ah, her love was worth something!” thought her sister, turning away with a sigh. She perceived that she must temporise.“Dear, Mr Wilbraham—Walter—will do what he himself thinks best; we can’t possibly decide for him—”“Please, ask him to stay,” Sylvia interrupted without heeding.“Ah, that I can’t do.”The girl twisted her fingers.“Then I must,” she said. “I’m afraid I shan’t persuade him, because, of course, I never can—but I must try. It’s all so funny, isn’t it?”“It’s horribly sad,” said Teresa to herself, “but certainly there will be no fear of the man staying. If it had been earlier in the day, he might have packed himself off at once. As it is, for a few hours, one must make the best of him and of it, and be thankful,”—she sighed—“that it has ended. I never wish to see him again. Oh, Sylvia, my little Sylvia! And I daresay he is persuading himself she doesn’t feel.”“I think I shall go and talk to Nina,” said the girl. Her eyes looked bright, and a feverish spot burned in each cheek.“Dear—stay here.”“Must I?” The old wistful dependence upon Teresa had come back. “I think it’s going to thunder, and that always frightens me. Nina says things which are nice.”“Lie down on your bed. I’ll hang up something over the window; Nina shall come and sit with you, and you’ll find yourself asleep before you know where you are. I’ll come back before dinner.”“Nina is going to make me somelatte di gallinato-night,” said Sylvia, unresisting.Teresa made her lie down, covered, coaxed, kissed her, then shrouded the window, guiltless of shutters. Nothing could be seen of Etna behind heavy menacing clouds which swept stormily up, and drifted sullenly along the purple slopes. The sea was lashing its white wild waves, which raced and plunged and flung themselves each on the other. Sylvia chattered about a hundred trifles—what Mary Maxwell had heard from England; whether her hat could not go in with Teresa’s; whether they had really better start on a Tuesday. If Teresa succeeded in stopping her, she quickly began again. Her sister decided at last that Nina might manage better, and was going to seek her. But when she reached the door, there was a sharp sudden terrified cry from Sylvia.“Teresa! Don’t go! Don’t leave me here by myself!”She had started up. Her sister instantly went back.“I won’t, dear, I won’t. I was only going to find Nina, because there isn’t the ghost of a bell in the house.”“Yes, I should like Nina,” said the girl, settling down again. Teresa called from the door, and the little woman hurried in with her long “Eh-h-h-h-h!” at sight of the darkened room.“It is the storm,” Teresa explained.“Eh, the storm? It will not come yet,” said Nina, with the almost unerring certainty by which an Italian peasant foretells the weather. “The signorina may sleep, and I will be here, but the storm not yet.Ecco!”Sylvia seemed content. Teresa flew to her grandmother’s room, longing to give vent to her pent-up indignation. She felt herself in the most hateful position in the world, and, woman-like, flung the whole weight of blame on Wilbraham. But Mrs Brodrick, whose eyes had long been open, was juster.“It was time it ended,” she said. “It has been a dreary mistake from first to last, and every day would have made it worse.”“I suppose so. And yet, and yet—”“Yes?”“If you had heard! Not one of us could have taken it so well. I don’t think she once remembered that it was hard on herself. Oh, I shall never forgive him!”“Ah!”“He had no right, no right!” cried Teresa hotly.“Ah!”“I—who have only tried to look at him with Sylvia’s eyes, for Sylvia’s sake!”“There you have it,” said Mrs Brodrick, with a smile. “The poor man was bewildered between two sets of eyes. I’m much more charitable, and so I’m not surprised.”“You’re very nearly as bad as he!” cried Teresa indignantly. “And, oh, what shall we do to stop Mary Maxwell’s remarks!”“Let her make them, I suppose; they will finish the sooner.”“There will be a great many to endure before they finish.”“Life is made up of such endurances,” said her grandmother patiently. “She can talk to me. I am old and dull; but a figure-head will serve at a stretch for a listener, and always has the advantage of not answering back again.”“And after all,” said Teresa hopefully, “her being with us is more cheerful for Sylvia. I think, poor dear, we shall be able to make her happy again in a little while—when he is well out of the way, as he will be soon.”Mrs Brodrick took up her knitting.“Shall you speak to him?” she asked carelessly.“If he wishes it. Certainly.”Teresa had thrown her head back like a spirited horse as she spoke, and at the same moment a knock came at the door. The English gentleman would be obliged if her excellency would give him a few words on the terrace.“Her excellency will,” she returned, flinging a defiant look at her grandmother, and resenting a shadow of doubt in her manner. She went out of the room quickly and silently, and Wilbraham, who was watching the windows from the end of the terrace, threw away his cigar and came to meet her. She saw that he was very pale, and her own manner was hard as she stood waiting for him to speak.“I feel that I owe you an explanation,” he began.“I thought, on the contrary, that you might be asking for one from us,” said Teresa at once coldly. “Sylvia has broken her engagement, she tells me.”He hesitated, and turned away his look.“I should have tried to make her happy,” he said, weighing his words.“You have failed, however, so far.”“It seems so.” He had hesitated again.“It is a pity,” went on Teresa relentlessly, “that you had not discovered the extent of your powers before attempting to apply them. You might have been saved this—”“Humiliation?”“Humiliation.”She stood upright, a slim dark figure, her eyes judging him gravely and coldly. Behind her were the thunder-clouds of Etna.“If humiliation were all, it would be nothing,” he said, his breath coming shortly. Perhaps he hoped she would have questioned him further. But her thoughts were with Sylvia.“No,” she said, “nothing.”“Of course,”—the words shot out from him in spite of himself—“you only see one side. I suppose I can’t induce you to judge fairly?”“I cannot see that my opinion is concerned. The affair is my sister’s. She has decided for herself. Absolutely independently,” she added, with the desire to drive home Sylvia’s capability.“But you approve?”“I think she has acted for her own happiness,” said Teresa guardedly.He looked gloomily at her.“Some day you may be kinder to me.”“Do you think so?” Her tone was not pleasant. “You will leave us to-morrow, of course, and it is unlikely that we shall often meet again.”He walked away a few steps and returned.“I tell you we will!” he said in a sharp passionate voice, which stung Teresa’s anger like a lash. She flung back her head and cried.“I never wish to see you again.”“That may be.” His words breathed thickly. “But I will see you.”A sudden dread of a scene swept over her, and forced self-control.“Whether we meet or not is of no possible consequence,” she said coolly. “I do not think it would be pleasant, and I hope you will have left Rome when we return. Meanwhile you and Sylvia must get through this evening as best you can. You have misunderstood her hitherto, and I suppose you will misunderstand her to the end.”She nodded and left him, not without thankfulness that he did not follow. It had been a sharp interview, charged with dangerous feeling, which enraged her against him. Thetable d’hôtehour was near, and she went to her own room, hoping to find Sylvia sleeping. As she opened the door, however, she heard her chatter.“Oh, Sylvia,” she said reproachfully—“when I wanted you to rest! And you haven’t even the excuse of a thunderstorm,” she added, pulling down her defence from the window, “for it has not come.”“But it is coming, eccellenza,” said Nina, joining her and speaking in a low voice. “It is coming in less than three hours. And there will be enough of it. It will keep people in the house to-night, that is one good thing.”“Why?” laughed Teresa.Nina’s face expressed blank unconsciousness.“Why? Who knows! We have a saying in my country, eccellenza, that where the eye does not see, mischief will not reach. A foolish saying, eh-h-h-h-h! But there are foolish ones everywhere, even at Viterbo.”“Get up and dress, Sylvia,” said her sister cheerfully. “And put on your prettiest frock.”But Sylvia for once was determined to wear nothing but a black which she generally hated.“What does it matter?” reflected Teresa. And yet she was wrong.Two or three Austrians had arrived that afternoon, so that there was a larger company than usual at the table, where great bunches of white and purple irises were stuck at intervals. The Maxwells came in late and tired, having climbed to the castle at the back of Taormina. Teresa was glad that Mary was thinking more of her fatigue and her dinner than of Sylvia’s affairs, and that the talk contrived to be general. It grew early dark, for the sky was by this time heavy with cloud, and thunder was muttering. The little Hungarian doctor and his wife were smoking cigarettes. Maxwell and Wilbraham had got hold of an English newspaper; Maxwell was confounding his own luck in not having his juniors’ chances over some of the little wars which England was waging, and Wilbraham answering at long intervals. Teresa took Mary Maxwell in hand, and goaded herself into sympathy over an account of her woes with her mother-in-law, hoping to leave Sylvia to talk or not as she liked. She found her work hard, for Mrs Maxwell was far too shrewd to put up with a perfunctory attention, and Teresa’s own mind was running through many sensations. She could not be sure how much Sylvia felt, how it would affect her; whether the kind of light chatter, into which she heard her break, acted as a relief or carried danger. She was sure that Wilbraham would construe it into the indifference of a trivial nature, and was torn between her desire that he should hold Sylvia less lightly and satisfaction that he could not believe himself mourned. The idea that it was she, she, whom ironical fate had chosen to interpose between Sylvia’s image and Wilbraham’s heart, made her coldly, cruelly contemptuous. That he should dream!“I shall go to bed,” yawned Mrs Maxwell, “though I don’t believe I shall be able to sleep a wink. Shall I take Jem away? He is such a blind old goose, he never sees that he is monopolising our lovers. But Sylvia is in high spirits to-night.”“Oh, don’t disturb anybody,” implored Teresa. “The thunder is getting nearer, and I shall have to sweep away Sylvia in ten seconds; she hates it so! I’ll come up for a minute afterwards if I may speak to you.”“Haven’t we been speaking?” laughed Mrs Maxwell, opening her eyes. “But come, come, by all means.”Her movement brought about others. Her husband went after her to fetch some newly-acquired treasure, which he wanted to show to the Hungarians; Wilbraham stood up, flung a hesitating glance on the group near the table, and stepped out on the terrace. Sylvia instantly and unexpectedly followed him. Teresa half rose, but Mrs Brodrick pulled her back.“Leave her,” she said. “It is her right. What a flash! What—”They stared at each other. Before the almost instantaneous answer of the thunder rolled out, a sharp short report anticipated it. The Hungarian doctor sprang up and dashed through the window, Teresa only a step behind him.“My God! Who is shot?” she heard him cry.
Teresa was in her room—the room the sisters shared—when Sylvia came in. The girl’s steps dragged with a suggestion of weariness, but she was smiling, and gave Teresa no impression of anything serious or sad having touched her life.
“Where is Nina?” she asked.
“Nina is going about singing mournfully—
“Venerdi e dì di Marte Non si sposa, e non si parte.
“We shall break Nina’s heart with all the bad luck we set to work to bring down on our devoted heads. To-morrow is Tuesday, and we travel.”
“Must we?” said Sylvia uneasily.
“Oh, baby!” She kissed her. “Well, I’m glad you’re at home. I believe there’s a thunderstorm on the way. Look at Etna.”
Clouds—dark, splendid clouds—were rolling up behind the great mountain. The light seemed suddenly to die out of the room.
“I hope it won’t come in the night,” said the girl. “Do you think it will? Of course, you don’t know; but I do think one sees it more in the dark.”
Teresa’s thoughts were not with the storm. They tenderly wrapped Sylvia, wondering how deep the pain would go.
“Darling, didn’t granny say she wanted you? Perhaps you’d better go to her; and then, then, mind you come back to me. To me,” she repeated tenderly.
“There’ll be time before dinner,” Sylvia objected without moving.
“She’s waiting, dear.”
“I’d rather talk to you, Teresa, please. There’s something I want to say. And it’s all so funny!” she went on, breaking into a nervous laugh.
The laugh reassured Teresa. The first words had sent the blood back to her heart.
“I’m listening,” she said gaily. “I hope it’s very, very funny.”
“Well, it is. At least I suppose most people would think so. Oh yes, it’s funny, of course. Teresa, you will marry him, won’t you?”
The marchesa turned a whitely-amazed face to her sister.
“I? Marry! Who—what?”
“Walter. Oh, I shall be able to call him Walter then, of course,” said Sylvia, laughing again and nodding. And suddenly the laugh frightened Teresa. She laid her two hands on the girl’s shoulders and looked into her eyes.
“Don’t laugh, please, dear,” she said gravely; “but tell me what you have in your mind. Has Walter said anything to you?”
“Itold him,” Sylvia answered proudly.
“What?”
“That we ought not to marry unless we both loved each other. You know, Teresa, that is quite right; and you know, too, that he isn’t fond of me any more, so, of course, we couldn’t. He thought we could. He thought perhaps it would do if I was happy; but I was sure I ought to say no. And so—” she drew a long breath—“I said it.”
“Ah, my poor dear!” cried Teresa, pulling down the pretty head upon her shoulder, and kissing her again. For the moment she had forgotten Sylvia’s first question, and it was the girl herself who reminded her.
“So now you will marry him, won’t you?”
Teresa had to keep check on herself, for she saw that Sylvia was in a state of tremulous excitement, and that she must speak very quietly, though inwardly fuming.
“What has put such a thing into your head—such an amazing thing? What could make you imagine that, under any possibility, I could marry Walter Wilbraham?”
“Because he likesyou,” said Sylvia simply.
“Likes me? Likes everybody, I suppose!”—scornfully.
“Not me. If he did, of course we should be married. Now it will be much better that he should marry you.”
Teresa felt sick with the difficulty of convincing, and the remembrance of Wilbraham’s look. Sylvia’s ideas came but rarely, but once come it was next to impossible to dislodge them. She lifted the girl’s chin, and looked steadily into her eyes while she spoke.
“Listen, dear,” she said slowly. “I want you to understand very clearly. You have made a great mistake. He is nothing to me, nothing, nothing—he never can be anything.”
“He likes you,” repeated Sylvia obstinately.
“Don’t say such horrid things!” Teresa cried more hotly.
“And I should like him to have what he wants. I shall be so sorry if he goes away to-morrow.”
“Of course he must go.”
“Why?”
“Sylvia, I could shake you! Because if he is to be nothing to you, nobody else wants him.”
Sylvia stood staring out at the gathering clouds.
“Oh, but I want him,” she said at last.
“Dear! Why? How can you?”
“Of course I want him to be happy. When you are fond of any one—”
Teresa stared at her. What could she say? She saw that the girl was over-strained—nervous; but this firm grasp of the one point she had seized was not to be loosened.
“Ah, her love was worth something!” thought her sister, turning away with a sigh. She perceived that she must temporise.
“Dear, Mr Wilbraham—Walter—will do what he himself thinks best; we can’t possibly decide for him—”
“Please, ask him to stay,” Sylvia interrupted without heeding.
“Ah, that I can’t do.”
The girl twisted her fingers.
“Then I must,” she said. “I’m afraid I shan’t persuade him, because, of course, I never can—but I must try. It’s all so funny, isn’t it?”
“It’s horribly sad,” said Teresa to herself, “but certainly there will be no fear of the man staying. If it had been earlier in the day, he might have packed himself off at once. As it is, for a few hours, one must make the best of him and of it, and be thankful,”—she sighed—“that it has ended. I never wish to see him again. Oh, Sylvia, my little Sylvia! And I daresay he is persuading himself she doesn’t feel.”
“I think I shall go and talk to Nina,” said the girl. Her eyes looked bright, and a feverish spot burned in each cheek.
“Dear—stay here.”
“Must I?” The old wistful dependence upon Teresa had come back. “I think it’s going to thunder, and that always frightens me. Nina says things which are nice.”
“Lie down on your bed. I’ll hang up something over the window; Nina shall come and sit with you, and you’ll find yourself asleep before you know where you are. I’ll come back before dinner.”
“Nina is going to make me somelatte di gallinato-night,” said Sylvia, unresisting.
Teresa made her lie down, covered, coaxed, kissed her, then shrouded the window, guiltless of shutters. Nothing could be seen of Etna behind heavy menacing clouds which swept stormily up, and drifted sullenly along the purple slopes. The sea was lashing its white wild waves, which raced and plunged and flung themselves each on the other. Sylvia chattered about a hundred trifles—what Mary Maxwell had heard from England; whether her hat could not go in with Teresa’s; whether they had really better start on a Tuesday. If Teresa succeeded in stopping her, she quickly began again. Her sister decided at last that Nina might manage better, and was going to seek her. But when she reached the door, there was a sharp sudden terrified cry from Sylvia.
“Teresa! Don’t go! Don’t leave me here by myself!”
She had started up. Her sister instantly went back.
“I won’t, dear, I won’t. I was only going to find Nina, because there isn’t the ghost of a bell in the house.”
“Yes, I should like Nina,” said the girl, settling down again. Teresa called from the door, and the little woman hurried in with her long “Eh-h-h-h-h!” at sight of the darkened room.
“It is the storm,” Teresa explained.
“Eh, the storm? It will not come yet,” said Nina, with the almost unerring certainty by which an Italian peasant foretells the weather. “The signorina may sleep, and I will be here, but the storm not yet.Ecco!”
Sylvia seemed content. Teresa flew to her grandmother’s room, longing to give vent to her pent-up indignation. She felt herself in the most hateful position in the world, and, woman-like, flung the whole weight of blame on Wilbraham. But Mrs Brodrick, whose eyes had long been open, was juster.
“It was time it ended,” she said. “It has been a dreary mistake from first to last, and every day would have made it worse.”
“I suppose so. And yet, and yet—”
“Yes?”
“If you had heard! Not one of us could have taken it so well. I don’t think she once remembered that it was hard on herself. Oh, I shall never forgive him!”
“Ah!”
“He had no right, no right!” cried Teresa hotly.
“Ah!”
“I—who have only tried to look at him with Sylvia’s eyes, for Sylvia’s sake!”
“There you have it,” said Mrs Brodrick, with a smile. “The poor man was bewildered between two sets of eyes. I’m much more charitable, and so I’m not surprised.”
“You’re very nearly as bad as he!” cried Teresa indignantly. “And, oh, what shall we do to stop Mary Maxwell’s remarks!”
“Let her make them, I suppose; they will finish the sooner.”
“There will be a great many to endure before they finish.”
“Life is made up of such endurances,” said her grandmother patiently. “She can talk to me. I am old and dull; but a figure-head will serve at a stretch for a listener, and always has the advantage of not answering back again.”
“And after all,” said Teresa hopefully, “her being with us is more cheerful for Sylvia. I think, poor dear, we shall be able to make her happy again in a little while—when he is well out of the way, as he will be soon.”
Mrs Brodrick took up her knitting.
“Shall you speak to him?” she asked carelessly.
“If he wishes it. Certainly.”
Teresa had thrown her head back like a spirited horse as she spoke, and at the same moment a knock came at the door. The English gentleman would be obliged if her excellency would give him a few words on the terrace.
“Her excellency will,” she returned, flinging a defiant look at her grandmother, and resenting a shadow of doubt in her manner. She went out of the room quickly and silently, and Wilbraham, who was watching the windows from the end of the terrace, threw away his cigar and came to meet her. She saw that he was very pale, and her own manner was hard as she stood waiting for him to speak.
“I feel that I owe you an explanation,” he began.
“I thought, on the contrary, that you might be asking for one from us,” said Teresa at once coldly. “Sylvia has broken her engagement, she tells me.”
He hesitated, and turned away his look.
“I should have tried to make her happy,” he said, weighing his words.
“You have failed, however, so far.”
“It seems so.” He had hesitated again.
“It is a pity,” went on Teresa relentlessly, “that you had not discovered the extent of your powers before attempting to apply them. You might have been saved this—”
“Humiliation?”
“Humiliation.”
She stood upright, a slim dark figure, her eyes judging him gravely and coldly. Behind her were the thunder-clouds of Etna.
“If humiliation were all, it would be nothing,” he said, his breath coming shortly. Perhaps he hoped she would have questioned him further. But her thoughts were with Sylvia.
“No,” she said, “nothing.”
“Of course,”—the words shot out from him in spite of himself—“you only see one side. I suppose I can’t induce you to judge fairly?”
“I cannot see that my opinion is concerned. The affair is my sister’s. She has decided for herself. Absolutely independently,” she added, with the desire to drive home Sylvia’s capability.
“But you approve?”
“I think she has acted for her own happiness,” said Teresa guardedly.
He looked gloomily at her.
“Some day you may be kinder to me.”
“Do you think so?” Her tone was not pleasant. “You will leave us to-morrow, of course, and it is unlikely that we shall often meet again.”
He walked away a few steps and returned.
“I tell you we will!” he said in a sharp passionate voice, which stung Teresa’s anger like a lash. She flung back her head and cried.
“I never wish to see you again.”
“That may be.” His words breathed thickly. “But I will see you.”
A sudden dread of a scene swept over her, and forced self-control.
“Whether we meet or not is of no possible consequence,” she said coolly. “I do not think it would be pleasant, and I hope you will have left Rome when we return. Meanwhile you and Sylvia must get through this evening as best you can. You have misunderstood her hitherto, and I suppose you will misunderstand her to the end.”
She nodded and left him, not without thankfulness that he did not follow. It had been a sharp interview, charged with dangerous feeling, which enraged her against him. Thetable d’hôtehour was near, and she went to her own room, hoping to find Sylvia sleeping. As she opened the door, however, she heard her chatter.
“Oh, Sylvia,” she said reproachfully—“when I wanted you to rest! And you haven’t even the excuse of a thunderstorm,” she added, pulling down her defence from the window, “for it has not come.”
“But it is coming, eccellenza,” said Nina, joining her and speaking in a low voice. “It is coming in less than three hours. And there will be enough of it. It will keep people in the house to-night, that is one good thing.”
“Why?” laughed Teresa.
Nina’s face expressed blank unconsciousness.
“Why? Who knows! We have a saying in my country, eccellenza, that where the eye does not see, mischief will not reach. A foolish saying, eh-h-h-h-h! But there are foolish ones everywhere, even at Viterbo.”
“Get up and dress, Sylvia,” said her sister cheerfully. “And put on your prettiest frock.”
But Sylvia for once was determined to wear nothing but a black which she generally hated.
“What does it matter?” reflected Teresa. And yet she was wrong.
Two or three Austrians had arrived that afternoon, so that there was a larger company than usual at the table, where great bunches of white and purple irises were stuck at intervals. The Maxwells came in late and tired, having climbed to the castle at the back of Taormina. Teresa was glad that Mary was thinking more of her fatigue and her dinner than of Sylvia’s affairs, and that the talk contrived to be general. It grew early dark, for the sky was by this time heavy with cloud, and thunder was muttering. The little Hungarian doctor and his wife were smoking cigarettes. Maxwell and Wilbraham had got hold of an English newspaper; Maxwell was confounding his own luck in not having his juniors’ chances over some of the little wars which England was waging, and Wilbraham answering at long intervals. Teresa took Mary Maxwell in hand, and goaded herself into sympathy over an account of her woes with her mother-in-law, hoping to leave Sylvia to talk or not as she liked. She found her work hard, for Mrs Maxwell was far too shrewd to put up with a perfunctory attention, and Teresa’s own mind was running through many sensations. She could not be sure how much Sylvia felt, how it would affect her; whether the kind of light chatter, into which she heard her break, acted as a relief or carried danger. She was sure that Wilbraham would construe it into the indifference of a trivial nature, and was torn between her desire that he should hold Sylvia less lightly and satisfaction that he could not believe himself mourned. The idea that it was she, she, whom ironical fate had chosen to interpose between Sylvia’s image and Wilbraham’s heart, made her coldly, cruelly contemptuous. That he should dream!
“I shall go to bed,” yawned Mrs Maxwell, “though I don’t believe I shall be able to sleep a wink. Shall I take Jem away? He is such a blind old goose, he never sees that he is monopolising our lovers. But Sylvia is in high spirits to-night.”
“Oh, don’t disturb anybody,” implored Teresa. “The thunder is getting nearer, and I shall have to sweep away Sylvia in ten seconds; she hates it so! I’ll come up for a minute afterwards if I may speak to you.”
“Haven’t we been speaking?” laughed Mrs Maxwell, opening her eyes. “But come, come, by all means.”
Her movement brought about others. Her husband went after her to fetch some newly-acquired treasure, which he wanted to show to the Hungarians; Wilbraham stood up, flung a hesitating glance on the group near the table, and stepped out on the terrace. Sylvia instantly and unexpectedly followed him. Teresa half rose, but Mrs Brodrick pulled her back.
“Leave her,” she said. “It is her right. What a flash! What—”
They stared at each other. Before the almost instantaneous answer of the thunder rolled out, a sharp short report anticipated it. The Hungarian doctor sprang up and dashed through the window, Teresa only a step behind him.
“My God! Who is shot?” she heard him cry.
Chapter Seventeen.Dazzled by the lightning glare, for a few instants Teresa could distinguish nothing but a heap of blackness. Then she saw Wilbraham kneeling on the ground with Sylvia in his arms.“Hold her—she’s hurt!” he cried hoarsely.As the doctor and Teresa raised her, he sprung to his feet and dashed into the gaping darkness.Teresa never could remember how the next few minutes passed. The shot must have startled others, for Nina, the padrone, Colonel Maxwell, all came running. Mrs Brodrick, too, was there.“Take her through the window to her room,” she said quietly.“Come on then,” said Colonel Maxwell, trying to speak cheerfully; “somebody open the window on the other side, and we shall soon see what’s wrong. Tell them, for Heaven’s sake, not to make such a confounded row,” he added to the Hungarian, who knew a little English.Teresa was voiceless, though all that was to be done she did with absolute precision. She helped to raise her, helped to lay her on the bed, sent the others away, and stayed alone with the doctor and her dead.For Sylvia was dead.The shot, which might have missed Wilbraham, had struck her full in the heart. Probably, in her black dress, undistinguishable in the darkness, she had been altogether unseen. There had not been time for a cry, a quiver. The life had gone out of her before she dropped.The little Hungarian doctor, his rosy face strangely moved, raised himself, and looked pitifully at Teresa, who held the candle. She stopped his faltering words, putting up her hand.“I know,” she said. “I knew it from the first.”He wanted very much to comfort her.“There could have been no pain, no consciousness—”“Oh yes, there was pain enough—as much as she could bear!” Teresa cried, the words wrung from her by the torture of an almost unbearable anguish. “If only she had died yesterday!”The doctor looked at her, and realised that here was something he could not understand, and had better not question.“You are overdone, Donna Teresa, and no wonder, after such a terrible shock,” he said quietly. “And there is also your grandmother to be considered. Will you go to her room, and take what I will send you? I will inform the others, and see to the necessary details. Indeed, you should not remain here.”His mind ran professionally forward to all that had to be done: the police, the strangers who would have to come and see for themselves. For this was no quiet death-bed where the mourners might sit silent in the hush of sorrow. Already there was a clamour of weeping outside the door—Peppina’s the loudest—and Teresa’s strange words made him afraid for her brain, so that he pressed her again.“Send in your own woman. She has got her wits about her. Afterwards, I give you my word, you shall come back.”Teresa waved him aside with a quiet gesture full of strength.“I shall not leave her,” she said, “and you need have no fears for me. There must be a great deal for you to do. Please see to it, and let Colonel Maxwell help you. Will you go to my grandmother first, and ask her to come to me in ten minutes? She and Nina—no one else.”So she had ten minutes alone with her dead—ten minutes in which to stand and gaze at the fair young face, unmarred by the withering finger of illness, still round, still soft, still smiling, yet suddenly invested with that great dignity which Death alone can give to those he calls. Never before had Sylvia looked inscrutable, mysterious, far away, far above them all. Teresa touched her, kissed her, strained her in her arms. She was not yet cold; her young limbs were still supple. Teresa could have believed life was lingering but for that look—the look of something more than life, something into which life had suddenly sprung, something which came back across a gulf. In one little moment, Sylvia, ignorant Sylvia, had solved the great problem, and smiled at them from beyond an immeasurable vastness. Teresa stretched out her arms—speechless—and grasped air.A sound disturbed her, and she looked round. There stood Wilbraham, haggard, breathless, drenched to the skin, changed almost out of recognition. At the door Nina had tried to stop him, but he pushed her aside. The two eyed each other.“Too—late?”Teresa only just caught the whisper.“It was momentary.” Her quiet amazed herself.His eyes persistently held away from Sylvia. He raised his hand to his wet hair, fingering it impatiently.“I did not catch him.”“Him? Who?”“The fellow who shot her—who shot at me.”“Who?” Teresa frowned, trying to remember. In the rush of the tragedy, she had forgotten that some one was responsible for it. “Oh,” she cried desperately, “what of that!”She turned away again. Against his will, Wilbraham’s blood-shot eyes followed hers to where Sylvia lay, serenely lifted above his level.“God forgive me!” he groaned.And before that supreme look of her dead, Teresa’s anger dropped into pity, and the saving tears rushed to her eyes.“And she, too!—She does, she does!” she cried brokenly, stretching out her hands.He seized them.“And you?”“And I.”He had his forgiveness. He would never have more.The End.
Dazzled by the lightning glare, for a few instants Teresa could distinguish nothing but a heap of blackness. Then she saw Wilbraham kneeling on the ground with Sylvia in his arms.
“Hold her—she’s hurt!” he cried hoarsely.
As the doctor and Teresa raised her, he sprung to his feet and dashed into the gaping darkness.
Teresa never could remember how the next few minutes passed. The shot must have startled others, for Nina, the padrone, Colonel Maxwell, all came running. Mrs Brodrick, too, was there.
“Take her through the window to her room,” she said quietly.
“Come on then,” said Colonel Maxwell, trying to speak cheerfully; “somebody open the window on the other side, and we shall soon see what’s wrong. Tell them, for Heaven’s sake, not to make such a confounded row,” he added to the Hungarian, who knew a little English.
Teresa was voiceless, though all that was to be done she did with absolute precision. She helped to raise her, helped to lay her on the bed, sent the others away, and stayed alone with the doctor and her dead.
For Sylvia was dead.
The shot, which might have missed Wilbraham, had struck her full in the heart. Probably, in her black dress, undistinguishable in the darkness, she had been altogether unseen. There had not been time for a cry, a quiver. The life had gone out of her before she dropped.
The little Hungarian doctor, his rosy face strangely moved, raised himself, and looked pitifully at Teresa, who held the candle. She stopped his faltering words, putting up her hand.
“I know,” she said. “I knew it from the first.”
He wanted very much to comfort her.
“There could have been no pain, no consciousness—”
“Oh yes, there was pain enough—as much as she could bear!” Teresa cried, the words wrung from her by the torture of an almost unbearable anguish. “If only she had died yesterday!”
The doctor looked at her, and realised that here was something he could not understand, and had better not question.
“You are overdone, Donna Teresa, and no wonder, after such a terrible shock,” he said quietly. “And there is also your grandmother to be considered. Will you go to her room, and take what I will send you? I will inform the others, and see to the necessary details. Indeed, you should not remain here.”
His mind ran professionally forward to all that had to be done: the police, the strangers who would have to come and see for themselves. For this was no quiet death-bed where the mourners might sit silent in the hush of sorrow. Already there was a clamour of weeping outside the door—Peppina’s the loudest—and Teresa’s strange words made him afraid for her brain, so that he pressed her again.
“Send in your own woman. She has got her wits about her. Afterwards, I give you my word, you shall come back.”
Teresa waved him aside with a quiet gesture full of strength.
“I shall not leave her,” she said, “and you need have no fears for me. There must be a great deal for you to do. Please see to it, and let Colonel Maxwell help you. Will you go to my grandmother first, and ask her to come to me in ten minutes? She and Nina—no one else.”
So she had ten minutes alone with her dead—ten minutes in which to stand and gaze at the fair young face, unmarred by the withering finger of illness, still round, still soft, still smiling, yet suddenly invested with that great dignity which Death alone can give to those he calls. Never before had Sylvia looked inscrutable, mysterious, far away, far above them all. Teresa touched her, kissed her, strained her in her arms. She was not yet cold; her young limbs were still supple. Teresa could have believed life was lingering but for that look—the look of something more than life, something into which life had suddenly sprung, something which came back across a gulf. In one little moment, Sylvia, ignorant Sylvia, had solved the great problem, and smiled at them from beyond an immeasurable vastness. Teresa stretched out her arms—speechless—and grasped air.
A sound disturbed her, and she looked round. There stood Wilbraham, haggard, breathless, drenched to the skin, changed almost out of recognition. At the door Nina had tried to stop him, but he pushed her aside. The two eyed each other.
“Too—late?”
Teresa only just caught the whisper.
“It was momentary.” Her quiet amazed herself.
His eyes persistently held away from Sylvia. He raised his hand to his wet hair, fingering it impatiently.
“I did not catch him.”
“Him? Who?”
“The fellow who shot her—who shot at me.”
“Who?” Teresa frowned, trying to remember. In the rush of the tragedy, she had forgotten that some one was responsible for it. “Oh,” she cried desperately, “what of that!”
She turned away again. Against his will, Wilbraham’s blood-shot eyes followed hers to where Sylvia lay, serenely lifted above his level.
“God forgive me!” he groaned.
And before that supreme look of her dead, Teresa’s anger dropped into pity, and the saving tears rushed to her eyes.
“And she, too!—She does, she does!” she cried brokenly, stretching out her hands.
He seized them.
“And you?”
“And I.”
He had his forgiveness. He would never have more.
The End.
|Chapter 1| |Chapter 2| |Chapter 3| |Chapter 4| |Chapter 5| |Chapter 6| |Chapter 7| |Chapter 8| |Chapter 9| |Chapter 10| |Chapter 11| |Chapter 12| |Chapter 13| |Chapter 14| |Chapter 15| |Chapter 16| |Chapter 17|