The Call of the Blood

That he should be alive and Delarey dead! How extraordinary that was! For

he had been close to death, so close that it would have seemed quite

natural to him to die. Had not Hermione come to him, he thought, he

would almost, at the crucial stage in his illness, have preferred to die.

It would have been a far easier, far simpler act than the return to

health and his former powers. And now he stood here alive, looking at the

sea, and Delarey's dead body was being carried to the hospital.

Was the fact that he was alive the cause of the fact that Delarey was

dead? Abruptly one of those furtive thoughts had leaped forward out of

its dark place and challenged him boldly, even with a horrible brutality.

Too late now to try to force it back. It must be faced, be dealt with.

Again, and much more strongly than on the previous day, Artois felt that

in Hermione's absence the Sicilian life of the dead man had not run

smoothly, that there had been some episode of which she knew nothing,

that he, Artois, had been right in his suspicions at the cottage. Delarey

had been in fear of something, had been on the watch. When he had sat by

the wall he had been tortured by some tremendous anxiety.

He had gone down to the sea to bathe. That was natural enough. And he had

been found dead under a precipice of rock in the sea. The place was a

dangerous one, they said. A man might easily fall from the rock in the

night. Yes; but why should he be there?

That thought now recurred again and again to the mind of Artois. Why had

Delarey been at the place where he had met his death? The authorities of

Marechiaro were going to inquire into that, were probably down at the sea

now. Suppose there had been some tragic episode? Suppose they should find

out what it was?

He saw Hermione in the midst of her grief the central figure of some

dreadful scandal, and his heart sickened.

But then he told himself that perhaps he was being led by his

imagination. He had thought that possible yesterday. To-day, after what

had occurred, he thought it less likely. This sudden death seemed to tell

him that his mind had been walking in the right track. Left alone in

Sicily, Delarey might have run wild. He might have gone too far. This

death might be a vengeance.

Artois was deeply interested in all human happenings, but he was not a

vulgarly curious man. He was not curious now, he was only afraid for

Hermione. He longed to protect her from any further grief. If there were

a dreadful truth to know, and if, by knowing it, he could guard her more

efficiently, he wished to know it. But his instinct was to get her away

from Sicily at once, directly the funeral was over and the necessary

arrangements could be made. For himself, he would rather go in ignorance.

He did not wish to add to the heavy burden of his remorse.