lie beneath those oak-trees in sight of
Etna and the sea. How she wished that she could lay his body there,
alone, away from all other dead. But that was impossible, she supposed.
She remembered the doctor's words. What were they going to do? She did
not know anything about Italian procedure in such an event. Would they
take him away? She had no intention of trying to resist anything, of
offering any opposition. It would be useless, and besides he had gone
away. Already he was far off. She did not feel, as many women do, that so
long as they are with the body of their dead they are also with the soul.
She would like to keep the dear body, to have it always near to her, to
live close to the spot where it was committed to the earth. But Maurice
was gone. Her Mercury had winged his way from her, obedient to a summons
that she had not heard. Always she had thought of him as swift, and
swiftly, without warning, he had left her. He had died young. Was that
wonderful? She thought not. No; age could have nothing to say to him,
could hold no commerce with him. He had been born to be young and never
to be anything else. It seemed to her now strange that she had not felt
this, foreseen that it must be so. And yet, only yesterday, she had
imagined a far future, and their child laying them in the ground of
Sicily, side by side, and murmuring "Buon riposo" above their mutual
sleep.

Their child! A life had been taken from her. Soon a life would be given
to her. Was that what is called compensation? Perhaps so. Many strange
thoughts, come she could not tell why, were passing through her mind as
she sat upon this height in the dawn. The thought of compensation
recalled to her the Book of Job. Everything was taken from Job; not only
his flocks and his herds, but his sons and his daughters. And then at the
last he was compensated. He was given new flocks and herds and new sons
and daughters. And it was supposed to be well with Job. If it was well
with Job, then Job had been a man without a heart.

Never could she be compensated for this loss, which she was trying to
realize, but which she would not be able to realize until the days went
by, and the nights, the days and the nights of the ordinary life, when
tragedy was supposed to be over and done with, and people would say, and
no doubt sincerely believe, that she was "getting accustomed" to her
loss.

Thinking of Job led her on to think of God's dealings with His creatures.

Hermio