Part 32 (1/2)

”She was not along,” said Lydia.

”Not along?” repeated Mrs. Erwin, feebly. ”Who--who were the other pa.s.sengers?”

”There were three gentlemen,” answered Lydia.

”Three gentlemen? Three men? Three--And you--and--” Mrs. Erwin fell back upon her pillow, and remained gazing at Lydia, with a sort of remote bewildered pity, as at perdition, not indeed beyond compa.s.sion, but far beyond help. Lydia's color had been coming and going, but now it settled to a clear white. Mrs. Erwin commanded herself sufficiently to resume: ”And there were--there were--no other ladies?”

”No.”

”And you were--”

”I was the only woman on board,” replied Lydia. She rose abruptly, striking the edge of the table in her movement, and setting its china and silver jarring. ”Oh, I know what you mean, aunt Josephine, but two days ago I couldn't have dreamt it! From the time the s.h.i.+p sailed till I reached this wicked place, there wasn't a word said nor a look looked to make me think I wasn't just as right and safe there as if I had been in my own room at home. They were never anything but kind and good to me.

They never let me think that they could be my enemies, or that I must suspect them and be on the watch against them. They were Americans!

I had to wait for one of your Europeans to teach me that,--for that officer who was here yesterday--”

”The cavaliere? Why, where--”

”He spoke to me in the cars, when Mr. Erwin was asleep! Had he any right to do so?”

”He would think he had, if he thought you were alone,” said Mrs. Erwin, plaintively. ”I don't see how we could resent it. It was simply a mistake on his part. And now you see, Lydia--”

”Oh, I see how my coming the way I have will seem to all these people!”

cried Lydia, with pa.s.sionate despair. ”I know how it will seem to that married woman who lets a man be in love with her, and that old woman who can't live with her husband because he's too good and kind, and that girl who swears and doesn't know who her father is, and that impudent painter, and that officer who thinks he has the right to insult women if he finds them alone! I wonder the sea doesn't swallow up a place where even Americans go to the theatre on the Sabbath!”

”Lydia, Lydia! It isn't so bad as it seems to you,” pleaded her aunt, thrown upon the defensive by the girl's outburst. ”There are ever so many good and nice people in Venice, and I know them, too,--Italians as well as foreigners. And even amongst those you saw, Miss Landini is one of the kindest girls in the world, and she had just been to see her old teacher when we met her,--she half takes care of him; and Lady Fenleigh's a perfect mother to the poor; and I never was at the Countess Tatocka's except in the most distant way, at a ball where everybody went; and is it better to let your uncle go to the opera alone, or to go with him? You told me to go with him yourself; and they consider Sunday over, on the Continent, after morning service, any way!”

”Oh, it makes no difference!” retorted Lydia, wildly. ”I am going away.

I am going home. I have money enough to get to Trieste, and the s.h.i.+p is there, and Captain Jenness will take me back with him. Oh!” she moaned.

”_He_ has been in Europe, too, and I suppose he's like the rest of you; and he thought because I was alone and helpless he had the right to--Oh, I see it, I see now that he never meant anything, and--Oh, oh, oh!” She fell on her knees beside the bed, as if crushed to them by the cruel doubt that suddenly overwhelmed her, and flung out her arms on Mrs.

Erwin's coverlet--it was of Venetian lace sewed upon silk, a choice bit from the palace of one of the ducal families--and buried her face in it.

Her aunt rose from her pillow, and looked in wonder and trouble at the beautiful fallen head, and the fair young figure shaken with sobs.

”He--who--what are you talking about, Lydia? Whom do you mean? Did Captain Jenness--”

”No, no!” wailed the girl, ”the one that gave me the book.”

”The one that gave you the book? The book you were looking at last night?”

”Yes,” sobbed Lydia, with her voice m.u.f.fled in the coverlet.

Mrs. Erwin lay down again with significant deliberation. Her face was still full of trouble, but of bewilderment no longer. In moments of great distress the female mind is apt to lay hold of some minor anxiety for its distraction, and to find a certain relief in it. ”Lydia,” said her aunt in a broken voice, ”I wish you wouldn't cry in the coverlet: it doesn't hurt the lace, but it stains the silk.” Lydia swept her handkerchief under her face but did not lift it. Her aunt accepted the compromise. ”How came he to give you the book?”

”Oh, I don't know. I can't tell. I thought it was because--because--It was almost at the very beginning. And after that he walked up and down with me every night, nearly; and he tried to be with me all he could; and he was always saying things to make me think--Oh dear, oh _dear_, oh dear! And he _tried_ to make me care for him! Oh, it was cruel, cruel!”

”You mean that he made love to you?” asked her aunt.

”Yes--no--I don't know. He tried to make me care for him, and to make me think he cared for me.”