r, of the gay splash as it entered the water.

"I know your son so well that I should like to know his mother," she
said.

Fabiano by this time had moved aside, and the two women were confronting
each other in the doorway. Behind Maddalena the two other women stared
and listened with all their might, giving their whole attention to this
unexpected scene.

"Are you the Signora of the island?" asked Maddalena.

"Yes, I am."

"Let the Signora in, Donna Maddalena," said Fabiano. "She is tired and
wants to rest."

Without saying anything Maddalena moved her broad body from the doorway,
leaving enough space for Hermione to enter.

"Thank you," said Hermione to Fabiano, giving him a couple of lire.

"Grazie, Signora. I will wait down-stairs to take you back."

He went off before she had time to tell him that was not necessary.

Hermione walked into Ruffo's home.

There were two rooms, one opening into the other. The latter was a
kitchen, the former the sleeping-room. Hermione looked quietly round it,
and her eyes fell at once upon a large green parrot, which was sitting
at the end of the board on which, supported by trestles of iron, the
huge bed of Maddalena and her husband was laid. At present this bed
was rolled up, and in consequence towered to a considerable height.
The parrot looked at Hermione coldly, with round, observant eyes whose
pupils kept contracting and expanding with a monotonous regularity.
She felt as if it had a soul that was frigidly ironic. Its pertinacious
glance chilled and repelled her, and she fancied it was reflected in the
faces of the women round her.

"Can I speak to you alone for a few minutes?" she asked Maddalena.

Maddalena turned to the two women and spoke to them loudly in dialect.
They replied. The old woman spoke at great length. She seemed always
angry and always upon the verge of tears. Over her shoulders she wore
a black shawl, and as she talked she kept fidgeting with it, pulling it
first to one side, then to the other, or dragging at it with her thin
and crooked yellow fingers. The parrot watched her steadily. Her hideous
voice played upon Hermione's nerves till they felt raw. At length,
looking back, as she walked, with bloodshot eyes, she went into the
kitchen, followed by the young woman. They began talking together in
sibilant whispers, like people conspiring.

After a moment of apparent hesitation Maddalena gave her visitor a
chair.

"Thank you," Hermione said,