him. He did not want Artois to come here to Sicily. He hated
his coming. He almost dreaded it as the coming of a spy. The presence of
Artois would surely take away all the savor of this wild, free life,
would import into it an element of the library, of the shut room, of that
intellectual existence which Maurice was learning to think of as almost
hateful.

And Hermione called upon him to rejoice with her over the fact that
Artois would be able to accompany her. How she misunderstood him! Good
God! how she misunderstood him! It seemed really as if she believed that
his mind was cast in precisely the same mould as her own, as if she
thought that because she and he were married they must think and feel
always alike. How absurd that was, and how impossible!

A sense of being near a prison door came upon him. He threw Hermione's
letter onto the writing-table, and went out into the sun.

When Gaspare returned that evening Maurice told him the news from Africa.
The boy's face lit up.

"Oh, then shall we go to London?" he said.

"Why not?" Maurice exclaimed, almost violently. "It will all be
different! Yes, we had better go to London!"

"Signorino."

"Well, what is it, Gaspare?"

"You do not like that signore to come here."

"I--why not? Yes, I--"

"No, signorino. I can see in your face that you do not like it. Your face
got quite black just now. But if you do not like it why do you let him
come? You are the padrone here."

"You don't understand. The signore is a friend of mine."

"But you said he was the friend of the signora."

"So he is. He is the friend of both of us."

Gaspare said nothing for a moment. His mind was working busily. At last
he said:

"Then Maddalena--when the signora comes will she be the friend of the
signora, as well as your friend?"

"Maddalena--that has nothing to do with it."

"But Maddalena is your friend!"

"That's quite different."

"I do not understand how it is in England," Gaspare said, gravely.
"But"--and he nodded his head wisely and spread out his hands--"I
understand many things, signorino, perhaps more than you think. You do
not want the signore to come. You are angry at his coming."

"He is a very kind signore," said Maurice, hastily. "And he can speak
dialetto."

Gaspare smiled and shook his head again. But he did not say anything
more. For a moment Maurice had an impulse to speak to him frankly, to
admit him into the intimacy of a friend. He was a Sicilian, al