"Quite true."
"He cannot walk with her here. He cannot even walk with her down the
street of Marechiaro alone. It would be a shame."
"But there is no harm in it."
"Who knows? It is not our custom. We walk with our friends and the girls
walk with their friends. If Salvatore, the father of Maddalena, knew--"
He did not finish his sentence, but, with sudden and startling violence,
made the gesture of drawing out a knife and thrusting it upward into the
body of an adversary. Maurice stopped on the path. He felt as if he had
seen a murder.
"Ecco!" said Gaspare, calmly, dropping his hand, and staring into
Maurice's face with his enormous eyes, which never fell before the gaze
of another.
"But--but--I mean no harm to Maddalena."
"It does not matter."
"But she did not tell me. She is ready to talk with me."
"She is a silly girl. She is flattered to see a stranger. She does not
think. Girls never think."
He spoke with utter contempt: "Have you seen Salvatore, signore?"
"No--yes."
"You have seen him?"
"Not to speak to. When I came down the cottage was shut up. I waited--"
"You hid, signore?"
Maurice's face flushed. An angry word rose to his lips, but he checked it
and laughed, remembering that he had to deal with a boy, and that
Gaspare was devoted to him.
"Well, I waited among the trees--birbante!"
"And you saw Salvatore?"
"He came out and went down to the fishing."
"Salvatore is a terrible man. He used to beat his wife Teresa."
"P'f! Would you have me be afraid of him?"
Maurice's blood was up. Even his sense of romance was excited. He felt
that he was in the coils of an adventure, and his heart leaped, but not
with fear.
"Fear is not for men. But the padrona has left you with me because she
trusts me and because I know Sicily."
It seemed to Maurice that he was with an inflexible chaperon, against
whose dominion it would be difficult, if not useless, to struggle. They
were walking on again, and had come into the ravine. Water was slipping
down among the rocks, between the twisted trunks of the olive-trees. Its
soft sound, and the cool dimness in this secret place, made Maurice
suddenly realize that he had passed the night without sleep, and that he
would be glad to rest. It was not the moment for combat, and it was not
unpleasant, after all--so he phrased it in his mind--to be looked after,
thought for, educated in the etiquette of the Enchanted Isle by a son of
its soil, with its wild passions and its firm repressions linked together
in his heart.