Part 25 (1/2)

They lunched at the Hotel Diomede before entering the precincts of the ruins. Mr. Bradshaw had invariably a splendid appet.i.te, and was by this time skilled in ordering the meals that suited him. The few phrases of Italian which he had appropriated were given forth _ore rotundo_, with Anglo-saxon emphasis on the _o_'s, and accompanied with large gestures.

His mere appearance always sufficed to put landlords and waiters into their most urbane mood; they never failed to take him for one of the English n.o.bility--a belief confirmed by the handsomeness of his gratuities. Mrs. Bradshaw was not, perhaps, the ideal lady of rank, but the fine self-satisfaction on her matronly visage, the good-natured disdain with which she allowed herself to be waited upon by foolish foreigners, her solid disregard of everything beyond the circle of her own party, were impressive enough, and exacted no little subservience.

Strong in the experience of two former visits, Mr. Bradshaw would have no guide to-day. Murray in hand, he knew just what he wished to see again, and where to find it.

As Miriam was at Pompeii for the first time, he took her especially under his direction, and showed her the city much as he might have led her over his silk-mill in Manchester. Unimbued with history and literature, he knew nothing of the scholar's or the poet's enthusiasm; his gratification lay in exercising his solid intelligence on a lot of strange and often grotesque facts. Here men had lived two thousand years ago. There was no mistake about it; you saw the deep ruts of their wheels along the rugged street; nay, you saw the wearing of their very feet on the comically narrow pavements. And their life had been as different as possible from that of men in Manchester. Everything excited him to merriment.

”Now, this is the house of old Pansa--no doubt an ancestor of friend Sancho”--with a twinkle in his eye. ”We'll go over this carefully, Mrs.

Baske; it's one of the largest and completest in Pompeii. Here we are in what they called the atrium.”

Cecily spoke seldom. Of course, she would have preferred to be alone here with Miriam; best of all--or nearly so--if they could have made the same party as at Baiae. At times she lingered a little behind the others, and seemed deep in contemplation of some object; or she stood to watch the lizards darting about the sunny old walls. When all were enjoying the view from the top of Jupiter's Temple, she gazed long towards the Sorrento promontory, the height of St. Angelo.

”Amalfi is over on the far side,” she said to Miriam. ”They are both working there now.”

Miriam replied nothing.

When they were in the Street of Tombs, Cecily again paused, by the sepulchre of the Priestess Mamia, whence there is a clear prospect across the bay towards the mountains. Turning back again, she heard a voice that made her tremble with delighted surprise. A wall concealed the speaker from her; she took a few quick steps, and saw Reuben Elgar shaking hands with the Bradshaws. He looked at her, and came forward.

She could not say any thing, and was painfully conscious of the blood that rushed to her face; never yet had she known this stress of heart-beats that made suffering of joy, and the misery of being unable to command herself under observant eyes.

It was years since Elgar and the Bradshaws had met. As a boy he had often visited their house, but from the time of his leaving home at sixteen to go to a boarding-school, his acquaintance with them, as with all his other Manchester friends, practically ceased. They had often heard of him--too often, in their opinion. Aware of his arrival at Naples, they had expressed no wish to see him. Still, now that he met them in this unexpected way, they could not but a.s.sume friendliness.

Jacob, not on the whole intolerant, was willing enough to take ”the lad” on his present merits; Reuben had the guise and manners of a gentleman, and perhaps was grown out of his reprobate habits. Mr.

Bradshaw and his wife could not but notice Cecily's agitation at the meeting; they exchanged wondering glances, and presently found an opportunity for a few words apart. What was going on? How had these two young folks become so intimate? Well, it was no business of theirs.

Lucky that Mrs. Baske was one of the company.

And why should Cecily disguise that now only was her enjoyment of the day begun--that only now had the suns.h.i.+ne its familiar brightness, the ancient walls and ways their true enchantment? She did not at once become more talkative, but the shadow had pa.s.sed utterly from her face, and there was no more listlessness in her movements.

”I have stopped here on my way to join Mallard,” was all Reuben said, in explanation of his presence.

All kept together. Mr. Bradshaw resumed his interest in antiquities, but did not speak so freely about them as before.

”Your brother knows a good deal more about these things than I do, Mrs.

Baske,” he remarked. ”He shall give us the benefit of his Latin.”

Miriam resolutely kept her eyes alike from Reuben and from Cecily.

Hitherto her attention to the ruins had been intermittent, but occasionally she had forgotten herself so far as to look and ponder; now she saw nothing. Her mind was gravely troubled; she wished only that the day were over.

As for Elgar, he seemed to the Bradshaws singularly quiet, modest, inoffensive. If he ventured a suggestion or a remark, it was in a subdued voice and with the most pleasant manner possible. He walked for a time with Mrs. Bradshaw, and accommodated himself with much tact to her way of regarding foreign things, whether ancient or modern. In a short time all went smoothly again.

Not since they shook hands had Elgar and Cecily encountered each other's glance. They looked at each other often, very often, but only when the look could not be returned; they exchanged not a syllable. Yet both knew that at some approaching moment, for them the supreme moment of this day, their eyes must meet. Not yet; not casually, and whilst others regarded them. The old ruins would be kind.

It was in the house of Meleager. They had walked among the coloured columns, and had visited the inner chamber, where upon the wall is painted the Judgment of Paris. Mr. Bradshaw pa.s.sed out through the narrow doorway, and his voice was dulled; Miriam pa.s.sed with him, and, close after her, Mrs. Bradshaw. Reuben seemed to draw aside for Cecily, but she saw his hand extended towards her--it held a spray of maidenhair that he had just gathered. She took it, or would have taken it, but her hand was closed in his.

”I have stayed only to see you again,” came panting from his lips. ”I could not go till I had seen you again!”

And before the winged syllables had ceased, their eyes met; nor their eyes alone, for upon both was the constraint of pa.s.sion that leaps like flame to its desire--mouth to mouth and heart to heart for one instant that concentrated all the joy of being.