Once, as there came a sound of dripping oars, she broke off suddenly.

A boat pa.s.sed very near them, and she nodded with a smile to the stout man in the faded uniform who was seated in the bows.

'What is it?' asked Dino, without lifting his head--he too had heard the sharp click of the rowlocks.

'Dino! are you awake? And I thought you were sleeping so sweetly. Did that boat wake you then? It was nothing; only the custom-house men rowing old Captain Piero home to get his dinner. See! there he is still waving his hand to me. I see him every day; he always pa.s.ses at this hour.'

'But he does not always see you singing a visitor asleep,' said Dino, sitting up rather hastily and looking after the departed boat. 'No, I was not dreaming, my Italia; unless it be a dream to feel one's whole heart and soul full of you.' The words slipped out unintentionally; an instant later he would have given anything to recall them. He felt sure she had taken in their full meaning by the very silence which fell upon her. She sat absolutely motionless; he was sure of it, but he would not trust himself to look at her. He only added, in a tone which he tried to make quite impersonal, 'I am afraid your Captain Piero will only have a poor opinion of my politeness. Do you think we could explain to him that I was not quite so insensible as I seemed?'

'I don't know,' said Italia, rising and laying down the guitar. She moved away a few steps and stood leaning against the gray b.u.t.tress, her scarlet neck handkerchief making a vivid spot of colour there like a flower.

'I can see--I think I can see my father's boat,' she said, bending forward and taking hold of the edge of the bridge's arch.

'Take care!'

Dino got up and went and stood beside her.

'Don't lean too far forward, dear. Is that Drea's boat? What eyes you have, my Italia! See, the wind is against her; she will have to come in on another tack.'

The patched sail bent and dipped as he spoke. The boat seemed gliding away from them.

He looked down at her. They were standing so close together now he could see the quick rise and fall of her breath; the stirring of the wind in her roughened hair; the quivering shadow where the long lashes rested on her cheek.

One hand hung loosely by her side. He barely touched it, with fingers that trembled.

'Italia!'

What were resolutions or remembrance? All the world had faded away; there were no living presences now but himself and this girl beside him, and that far-off winged boat moving slowly towards them across the shining water. 'My Italia?' She turned a radiant face towards him.

The momentary shyness which had made her leave her place was gone now; there was only left a deep look of rapture in the dark loving eyes.

'Yes, Dino. You _do_ love me. I know it,' she said simply. She did not change her expectant att.i.tude; but she moved her hand until the little brown fingers clasped his.

They stood so for fully a minute without speaking, their eyes fixed on the approaching boat. 'And you love me too, Italia? You will say that you love me?' Dino said in a half whisper. He had not meant to say this. He had resolved not to say it; but what was the good of prudence now? The patched sail was drawing nearer; there was only this one moment left in which fearfully to s.n.a.t.c.h at perfect joy. He held his breath lest she should delay to speak.

But Italia answered him with grave simplicity. There was not the shadow of a doubt in her heart, not a cloud upon her heaven of content.

Perhaps they had never been farther apart, these two, in all their sensations, than at this first moment of supreme understanding.

'I do love you,' she said, in her clear full voice. And then at the sound of her own words she started; Dino felt the movement of her fingers in his; her eyes filled with happy tears, and the colour swept in a quick wave over her pale face and throat. 'I think I have always loved you--after my father--always, since I was a little girl, my Dino,' she said softly.

'Only--after your father, Italia?'

She hesitated; but he had asked his question an instant too late, for now the wind had really caught the flapping sail of the _Bella Maria_; they could see the quick movement of old Drea's hand on the tiller, and hear his voice calling out an order to Maso. In another moment the two men had brought the old brown boat cleverly alongside. Dino made a quick catch at the rope that was flung to him; there was a momentary struggle of strong-armed Maso with the heavy sail.

'Well, lad,' said Drea, standing up at his place by the helm and looking about him. 'Well, my little girl!'

'Was it a good morning's work, father?'

'_Mah_! ... I've seen worse days, child, I've seen worse days. Mind what you are about with those nets, you Maso! That's right, lad; give him a hand. We wanted another man with us, but I've seen worse hauls for all that. You'll be ready to go out with us to-night, eh, Dino?'

'Yes, Sor Drea.'

'Ay, ay. You'd have come with us this morning fast enough, I'm thinking, but the girl there wouldn't hear of my sending for you. "He has had a hard day; he will be so tired, father," she said. Tired!

_Santissima Vergine!_ and she a sailor's daughter!' The old man chuckled, straightening his back and rubbing his stiffened shoulder joints. 'But, bless you, they're all alike, and even one's own daughter is a woman. Women! they'll pray all day for rain, and be frightened the first minute they see a cloud in the sky.--You'll get your dinner here, Maso.'

Maso, a broad-backed young fellow in a blue jacket, looked up from the wet heap of nets with a smile which showed all his white teeth. 'Ay, Sor Drea.'

'And I must be off home,' said Dino, looking at Italia.

'Ay, lad. You'll stay another time likely. There won't be too much dinner to-day for three of us,' the fisherman said simply, 'and Maso has earned his share. The chestnut is for the man who takes its sh.e.l.l off: that's my way o' thinking.'

'I could not stop in any case; thanking you kindly all the same, Sor Drea. I told my mother I'd be back to dinner. By the way, I was to ask you if it is all settled about our going up there?' he nodded in the direction of Monte Nero.

'Ay, ay. 'Tis settled for Sunday fast enough. Sora Catarina has only to get herself ready. We might have had worse luck, Maso; we might have had worse luck. 'Twas stiffish work with only two of us,' old Drea said, sitting down on the edge of the platform with his feet in the boat to light his pipe. '_Mah! ... che volete_? There's nothing like the day after a storm for finding out the colour o' the bottom o'

things. There's good in every wind that blows, lad, for a man who knows how to set his sail.'

He thrust a heap of the wet shining fish aside with his foot.

'When there's not so many o' the big there's more o' the little. You know what I'm always telling you. The Devil himself, _con rispetto parlando_, the Devil himself has a curly tail.'

END OF VOL. I.