Into the garden of rest had come trouble and pain, for the end was at hand.
HE sat in the sun, on the stone wall that divided the garden from the great lake, and swung his legs, silently gazing with his soul in his eyes, and SHE, in a long wicker chair, sideways to him, shaded her face with her hand and looked down. The soul went out of him, and hovering over the waving hair, and the dimple at the corner of the drooping mouth, peeped through the fingers of the dear hand at its true and only resting places—those brown pools over whose depths lay the clouding shadow of the morrow.
But another twenty-four hours, and then back to prison—to prison—to prison. The thought beat through both hearts, with the level monotony of a tolling for the dead, for the glorious dead, for the month past of a sweet and lovely life together in the garden of rest.
To-morrow was the ending of all life and light, bringing with it for her a separation from the true self, a return behind the triumphant car of a mocking and over-riding fate, to a caged existence, a loathed companionship, a weary, weary beating of the breast against the bars; for him—a legion of mind-devils, torturing, twisting, lying in wait at every turn and corner of life, ever alert and ever cruel, and a dreary, craving ache.
To-morrow was the farewell of their love, perhaps till the grave—who knows? their great and burning love, that had given all and taken all, that had cared with an exceeding tenderness for every thought and movement, that was old, yet had not tired, that had known and understood, having no depths left to sound, no heights to win; that tree which, planted in the moist, cool earth of comradeship, had grown steadily and grandly till it rejoiced in the sweet foliage of a perfect trust, and the glorious flowers of passion. The day looked on, and laughed in slanting rays of heat and light, and presently on a snow-cooled breeze wafted between two towering heights came a chime of far-off Italian bells.
She looked up into his face, and smiled.
'Shall I sing my Love a little song?' she said. And as he knelt beside her, she held his head in her two hands, and sang shyly into his ear, in time to the drifting cadence.
Out of his eyes fled hunger and pain, and he leaned his forehead on her breast, and so they drank of the merciful well of peace. The chime floated faintly past them with a note of invitation.
'The bells have got into my head, darling. I'm mad, I think,—I can't feel anything—Child of mine, come for a drive, and find the bells; we'll get drunk on sun, and air, and sky, and mountains, and—kisses, and forget there is a to-morrow and an ending.'
He stood up straight and strong, and drew her to him.
So they waited, and the chime floated once more past, while they looked life again into each other's eyes.
Then, with his arm around her shoulder, and hers drawn round his waist, they walked through the garden of rest to the gate where the angel of Publicity threatened such proceeding with a flaming and respectable sword.
'The sun is very yellow and hot here by the side of the water, and the flies are like to a hundred devils on my good Nicolas—Ugh! Pighead, what good to shake thy bell! It is not good sitting here, for I have only money for one—two—three—yes, for four drinkings, in my pouch, and the last a little one, and the day is hot. Eleven of the clock, for there begins the morning tolling from San Felice. Where be these fools of strangers? There be many things to see, also my chariot is very strong, and beautiful exceedingly, and my good grey Nicolas, is he not a most willing puller, being still young and lusty? Yet, forsooth, because it is the Sabbath, they will not stir forth—these fools—but sit at home in sad garments, and eat, thinking to make the day holy.
'Ai! What are these? Can it be they are coming? Ai—Ai—si signore, si, si, signora, si, si, si.... This is several drinkings; moreover they appear to be English. A very curious peoples, the English—for some reason known only of God they speak to me in French, as if I, Pietro, understood French, forsooth. However, it is all the same thing; the he waves his hat to the West, and says—"San Feiice;"—now San Felice is in the South;—the she says "Campenella," and does not wave anythings,—decidedly she is the more intelligent; and I, Pietro, the most intelligent of all, for I nod my top once, twice, three times strongly, and say "San Felice, si, si," and beat my grey, and lo! we are off, and they have forgotten to bargain. Ho! A very curious peoples!