e was thrilled by a sense of romance, of
adventure, that had never been his when his English wife was there beside
him, calling his mind to walk with hers, his heart to beat with hers,
calling with the great sincerity of a very perfect love.

"The poor signora!" said Gaspare. "I saw her beginning to cry when the
train went away. She loves my country and cannot bear to leave it. She
ought to live here always, as I do."

"Courage, Gaspare!" said Maurice, putting his hand on the boy's shoulder.
"She'll come back very soon."

Gaspare lifted his hand to his eyes, then drew out a red-and-yellow
handkerchief with "Caro mio" embroidered on it and frankly wiped them.

"The poor signora!" he repeated. "She did not like to leave us."

"Let's think of her return," said Maurice.

He turned away suddenly from the terrace and went into the house.

When he was there, looking at the pictures and books, at the open piano
with some music on it, at a piece of embroidery with a needle stuck
through the half-finished petal of a flower, he began to feel deserted.
The day was before him. What was he going to do? What was there for him
to do? For a moment he felt what he would have called "stranded." He was
immensely accustomed to Hermione, and her splendid vitality of mind and
body filled up the interstices of a day with such ease that one did not
notice that interstices existed, or think they could exist. Her physical
health and her ardent mind worked hand-in-hand to create around her an
atmosphere into which boredom could not come, yet from which bustle was
excluded. Maurice felt the silence within the house to be rather dreary
than peaceful. He touched the piano, endeavoring to play with one finger
the tune of "O sole mio!" He took up two or three books, pulled the
needle out of Hermione's embroidery, then stuck it in again. The feeling
of loss began to grow upon him. Oddly enough, he thought, he had not felt
it very strongly at the station when the train ran out. Nor had it been
with him upon the terrace. There he had been rather conscious of change
than of loss--of change that was not without excitement. But now--He
began to think of the days ahead of him with a faint apprehension.

"But I'll live out-of-doors," he said to himself. "It's only in the house
that I feel bad like this. I'll live out-of-doors and take lots of
exercise, and I shall be all right."

He had again taken up a book, almost without knowing it, and now, holding