At about nine o'clock next morning Perfetta went out on to the loggia, not to look at the view, but to throw some dirty water at it."Scusi tanto!" she wailed, for the water spattered a tall young lady who had for some time been tapping at the lower door.
"Is Signor Carella in?" the young lady asked.
It was no business of Perfetta's to be shocked, and the style of the visitor seemed to demand the reception-room.Accordingly she opened its shutters, dusted a round patch on one of the horsehair chairs, and bade the lady do herself the inconvenience of sitting down.Then she ran into Monteriano and shouted up and down its streets until such time as her young master should hear her.
The reception-room was sacred to the dead wife.
Her shiny portrait hung upon the wall--similar, doubtless, in all respects to the one which would be pasted on her tombstone.A little piece of black drapery had been tacked above the frame to lend a dignity to woe.
But two of the tacks had fallen out, and the effect was now rakish, as of a drunkard's bonnet.A coon song lay open on the piano, and of the two tables one supported Baedeker's "Central Italy," the other Harriet's inlaid box.And over everything there lay a deposit of heavy white dust, which was only blown off one moment to thicken on another.
It is well to be remembered with love.It is not so very dreadful to be forgotten entirely.But if we shall resent anything on earth at all, we shall resent the consecration of a deserted room.
Miss Abbott did not sit down, partly because the antimacassars might harbour fleas, partly because she had suddenly felt faint, and was glad to cling on to the funnel of the stove.She struggled with herself, for she had need to be very calm; only if she was very calm might her behaviour be justified.She had broken faith with Philip and Harriet: she was going to try for the baby before they did.If she failed she could scarcely look them in the face again.
"Harriet and her brother," she reasoned, "don't realize what is before them.She would bluster and be rude; he would be pleasant and take it as a joke.Both of them--even if they offered money--would fail.But I begin to understand the man's nature; he does not love the child, but he will be touchy about it--and that is quite as bad for us.He's charming, but he's no fool; he conquered me last year; he conquered Mr.Herriton yesterday, and if I am not careful he will conquer us all today, and the baby will grow up in Monteriano.He is terribly strong; Lilia found that out, but only I remember it now."This attempt, and this justification of it, were the results of the long and restless night.Miss Abbott had come to believe that she alone could do battle with Gino, because she alone understood him; and she had put this, as nicely as she could, in a note which she had left for Philip.It distressed her to write such a note, partly because her education inclined her to reverence the male, partly because she had got to like Philip a good deal after their last strange interview.His pettiness would be dispersed, and as for his "unconventionality," which was so much gossiped about at Sawston, she began to see that it did not differ greatly from certain familiar notions of her own.If only he would forgive her for what she was doing now, there might perhaps be before them a long and profitable friendship.
But she must succeed.No one would forgive her if she did not succeed.
She prepared to do battle with the powers of evil.
The voice of her adversary was heard at last, singing fearlessly from his expanded lungs, like a professional.Herein he differed from Englishmen, who always have a little feeling against music, and sing only from the throat, apologetically.He padded upstairs, and looked in at the open door of the reception-room without seeing her.
Her heart leapt and her throat was dry when he turned away and passed, still singing, into the room opposite.It is alarming not to be seen.
He had left the door of this room open, and she could see into it, right across the landing.It was in a shocking mess.Food, bedclothes, patent-leather boots, dirty plates, and knives lay strewn over a large table and on the floor.But it was the mess that comes of life, not of desolation.It was preferable to the charnel-chamber in which she was standing now, and the light in it was soft and large, as from some gracious, noble opening.
He stopped singing, and cried "Where is Perfetta?"His back was turned, and he was lighting a cigar.
He was not speaking to Miss Abbott.He could not even be expecting her.The vista of the landing and the two open doors made him both remote and significant, like an actor on the stage, intimate and unapproachable at the same time.She could no more call out to him than if he was Hamlet.
"You know!" he continued, "but you will not tell me.Exactly like you." He reclined on the table and blew a fat smoke-ring."And why won't you tell me the numbers? I have dreamt of a red hen--that is two hundred and five, and a friend unexpected--he means eighty-two.But I try for the Terno this week.So tell me another number."Miss Abbott did not know of the Tombola.His speech terrified her.She felt those subtle restrictions which come upon us in fatigue.Had she slept well she would have greeted him as soon as she saw him.Now it was impossible.He had got into another world.
She watched his smoke-ring.The air had carried it slowly away from him, and brought it out intact upon the landing.
"Two hundred and five--eighty-two.In any case I shall put them on Bari, not on Florence.I cannot tell you why; I have a feeling this week for Bari." Again she tried to speak.
But the ring mesmerized her.It had become vast and elliptical, and floated in at the reception-room door.
"Ah! you don't care if you get the profits.
You won't even say 'Thank you, Gino.' Say it, or I'll drop hot, red-hot ashes on you.'Thank you, Gino--'"The ring had extended its pale blue coils towards her.She lost self-control.It enveloped her.As if it was a breath from the pit, she screamed.
