had run away from the bridal supper of Griffeo, the
coppersmith's son,--just in the midst of his music; run away home, he
and his violin.

"They were not deaf," resumed Palma. "But your music was so sad--and
they were merry."

"I played what came to me," said Signa.

"But you are merry sometimes."

"Not in a little room with oilwicks burning, and a stench of wine, and
people round me. People always make me sad."

"Why that?"

"Because--I do not know:--when a number of faces are round me I seem
stupid; it is as if I were in a cage; I feel as if God went away,
farther, farther, farther!"

"But God made men and women."

"Yes. But I wonder if the trapped birds, and the beaten dogs, and the
smarting mules, and the bleeding sheep think so."

"Oh, Signa!"

"I think they must doubt it," said Signa.

"But the beasts are not Christians, the priests say so," said Palma, who
was a very true believer.

"I know. But I think they are. For they forgive. We never do."

"Some of us do."

"Not as the beasts do. Agnoto's house-lamb, the other day, licked his
hand as he cut its throat. He told me so."

"That was because it loved him," said Palma.

"And how can it love if it have not a soul?" said Signa.

Palma munched her crust. This sort of meditation, which Signa was very
prone to wander in, utterly confused her.

She could talk at need, as others could, of the young cauliflowers, and
the spring lettuces, and the chances of the ripening corn, and the look
of the budding grapes, and the promise of the weather, and the
likelihood of drought, and the Parocco's last sermon, and the gossips'
last history of the neighbours, and the varying prices of fine and of
coarse plaiting; but anything else--Palma was more at ease with the
heavy pole pulling against her, and the heavy bucket coming up sullenly
from the water-hole.

She felt, when he spoke in this way, much as Bruno did--only far more
intensely--as if Signa went away from her--right away into the sky
somewhere--as the swallows went when they spread their wings to the
east, or the blue wood-smoke when it vanished.

"You love your music better than you do Bruno, or me, or anything,
Signa," she said, with a little sorrow that was very humble, and not in
the least reproachful.

"Yes," said Signa, with the unconscious cruelty of one in whom Art is
born predominant. "Do you know, Palma," he said suddenly, after a
pause--"Do you know--I think I could make something be