leness, or spelled out the meaning
of Petrarchan sonnets in an old vellum copy she had found in the
library. Sometimes she sat brooding in one of the faded gilt and
crimson chairs in the salon, by the diminutive fireplace where two or
three tiny twigs burned out their lives in an Italian thought of heat.

What did a Greek god do when sunshine disappeared? she wondered. Or had
the god of the sun gone away altogether, and was this deluge the
result? The shepherd Antoli had been taken home, Giacomo assured her,
but he was exceedingly reticent when asked who was herding the sheep,
only shrugging his shoulders with a "Chi lo sa?"

On the second day of the rain Daphne saw that the flock had come near
the house. From the dining-room window she could see the sheep, with
water soaking into their thick wool. Some one was guarding them. With
little streams dashing from the drooping felt hat to the sheepskin clad
shoulders, the keeper stood, motionless in the pelting rain. The sheep
ate greedily the wet, juicy grass, while the shepherd leaned on his
staff and watched. Undoubtedly it was Antoli's peasant successor,
Daphne thought, as she stood with her face to the dripping window pane.
Then the shepherd turned, and she recognized, under the wet hat brim,
the glowing color and undaunted smile of her masquerading god. Whether
he saw her or not she could not tell, but she stood by the storm-washed
window in her scarlet house gown and watched, longing to give him
shelter.

CHAPTER IX

He came to her next through music, when the rain clouds had broken
away. That divine whistle, mellow, mocking, irresistible, still was
heard when morning lay on the hills. Often, when afternoon had touched
all the air to gold, when the shadows of chestnut and cypress and
gnarled olive lay long on the grass, other sounds floated down to
Daphne, music from some instrument that she did not know. It was no
harp, surely, yet certain clear, ranging notes seemed to come from the
sweeping of harp strings; again, it had all the subtle, penetrating
melody of the violin. Whatever instrument gave it forth, it drew the
girl's heart after it to wander its own way. When it was gay it won
her feet to some dance measure, and all alone in the great empty rooms
she would move to it with head thrown back and her whole body swaying
in a new sense of rhythm. When it was sad, it set her heart to beating
in great throbs, for then it begged and pleaded. There