Presently the clock Gaspare had brought from the fair chimed, then played
the "Tre Colori." Lucrezia had set it to play that evening when she was
waiting for the padrone to return from the sea.
When he heard the tinkling tune Gaspare lifted his head and listened till
it was over. It recalled to him all the glories of the fair. He saw his
padrone before him. He remembered how he had decorated Maurice with
flowers, and he felt as if his heart would break.
"The povero signorino! the povero signorino!" he cried, in a choked
voice. "And I put roses above his ears! Si, signora, I did! I said he
should be a real Siciliano!"
He began to rock himself to and fro. His whole body shook, and his face
had a frantic expression that suggested violence.
"I put roses above his ears!" he repeated. "That day he was a real
Siciliano!"
"Gaspare--Gaspare--hush! Don't! Don't!"
She held his hand and went on speaking softly.
"We must be quiet in here. We must remember to be quiet. It isn't our
fault, Gaspare. We did all we could to make him happy. We ought to be
glad of that. You did everything you could, and he loved you for it. He
was happy with us. I think he was. I think he was happy till the very
end. And that is something to be glad of. Don't you think he was very
happy here?"
"Si, signora!" the boy whispered, with twitching lips.
"I'm glad I came back in time," Hermione said, looking at the dark hair
on the pillow. "It might have happened before, while I was away. I'm glad
we had one more day together."
Suddenly, as she said that, something in the mere sound of the words
seemed to reveal more clearly to her heart what had befallen her, and for
the first time she began to cry and to remember. She remembered all
Maurice's tenderness for her, all his little acts of kindness. They
seemed to pass rapidly in procession through her mind on their way to her
heart. Not one surely was absent. How kind to her he had always been! And
he could never be kind to her again. And she could never be kind to
him--never again.
Her tears went on falling quietly. She did not sob like Gaspare. But she
felt that now she had begun to cry she would never be able to stop again;
that she would go on crying till she, too, died.