her fear from his own words. He became really natural, really
truthful in his fear. And--she scarcely knew why--Hermione was even more
governed by him than by Artois. He had lived with them in the Casa
del Prete, had been an intimate part of their life there. And he was
Sicilian of the soil. The boy had a real power to move, to dominate her,
which he did not then suspect.

Again and again he repeated those words, "_La povera bambina--la povera
piccola bambina_." And at last Hermione was overcome.

"I won't go to Sicily," she said to Artois. "For if I went there I could
only go to Monte Amato. I won't go until Vere is old enough to wish to
go, to wish to see the house where her father and I were happy."

And she had never gone back. For Artois had not been satisfied with this
early victory.

In returning from a tour in North America the following spring, when
Vere was nearly two years old, he had paid a visit to Marechiaro, and,
while there, had seen the contadino from whom Hermione had rented, and
still rented, the house of the priest. The man was middle-aged, ignorant
but shrewd, and very greedy. Artois made friends with him, and casually,
over a glass of _moscato_, talked about his affairs and the land
question in Sicily. The peasant became communicative and, of course,
loud in his complaining. His land yielded nothing. The price of almonds
had gone down. The lemon crop had been ruined by the storms. As to the
vines--they were all devoured by the phylloxera, and he had no money to
buy and plant vines from America. Artois hinted that he received a good
rent from the English lady for the cottage on Monte Amato. The contadino
acknowledged that he received a fair price for the cottage and the land
about it; but the house, he declared, would go to rack and ruin with no
one ever in it, and the land was lying idle, for the English lady would
have everything left exactly as it had been when she lived there with
her husband. Artois seized upon this hint of what was in the peasant's
mind, and bemoaned with him his situation. The house ought to be
occupied, the land all about it, up to the very door, and behind upon
the sunny mountain-side, planted with American vines. If it belonged to
him that was what he would do--plant American vines, and when the years
of yielding came, give a good percentage on all the wine made and sold
to the man who had tended the vineyard.

The peasant's love of money awoke. He only let the cottage