ught seemed to soothe the boy. He kneeled down by his padrona
under the wall of the Campo Santo by which Protestants were buried, and
whispered a petition for the repose of the soul of his padrone. Into the
gap of earth, where now the coffin lay, he had thrown roses from his
father's little terreno near the village. His tears fell fast, and his
prayer was scarcely more than a broken murmur of "Povero
signorino--povero signorino--Dio ci mandi buon riposo in Paradiso."
Hermione could not pray although she was in the attitude of supplication;
but when she heard the words of Gaspare she murmured them too. "Buon
riposo!" The sweet Sicilian good-night--she said it now in the stillness
of the lonely dawn. And her tears fell fast with those of the boy who had
loved and served his master.

When the funeral was over she walked up the mountain with Gaspare to the
Casa del Prete, and from there, on the following day, she sent a message
to Artois, asking him if he would come to see her.

"I don't ask you to forgive me for not seeing you before," she
wrote. "We understand each other and do not need explanations. I
wanted to see nobody. Come at any hour when you feel that you would
like to.
HERMIONE."

Artois rode up in the cool of the day, towards evening.

He was met upon the terrace by Gaspare.

"The signora is on the mountain, signore," he said. "If you go up you
will find her, the povero signora. She is all alone upon the mountain."

"I will go, Gaspare. I have told Maddalena. I think she will be silent."

The boy dropped his eyes. His unreserve of the island had not endured. It
had been a momentary impulse, and now the impulse had died away.

"Va bene, signore," he muttered.

He had evidently nothing more to say, yet Artois did not leave him
immediately.

"Gaspare," he said, "the signora will not stay here through the great
heat, will she?"

"Non lo so, signore."

"She ought to go away. It will be better if she goes away."

"Si, signore. But perhaps she will not like to leave the povero
signorino."

Tears came into the boy's eyes. He turned away and went to the wall, and
looked over into the ravine, and thought of many things: of readings
under the oak-trees, of the tarantella, of how he and the padrone had
come up from the fishing singing in the sunshine. His heart was full, and
he felt dazed. He was so accustomed to being always with hi