Mare Nostrum (Our Sea) Part 25

Ferragut was about to go on talking when the two ladies entered with a tray which contained the tea service and various plates of cakes. The captain saw nothing strange in their lack of servants. The doctor and her friend were to him a pair of women of extraordinary customs, and so he thought all their acts were logical and natural. Freya served the tea with modest grace as though she were the daughter of the house.

They pa.s.sed the rest of the afternoon conversing on distant voyages.

n.o.body alluded to the war, nor to Italy's problem at that moment as to whether she should maintain or break her neutrality. They appeared to be living in an inaccessible place thousands of leagues from all human bustle.

The two women were treating the count with the well-bred familiarity of persons in the same rank of life, but at times the sailor fancied that he noted that they were afraid of him.

At the end of the afternoon this personage arose and Ferragut did the same, understanding that he was expected to bring his visit to an end.

The count offered to accompany him. While he was bidding the doctor good-by, thanking her with extreme courtesy for having introduced him to the captain, Ferragut felt that Freya was clasping his hand in a meaning way.

"Until to-night," she murmured lightly, hardly moving her lips. "I shall see you later.... Expect me."

Oh, what happiness!... The eyes, the smile, the pressure of her hand were telling him much more than that.

Never did he take such an agreeable stroll as when walking beside Kaledine through the streets of Chiaja toward the sh.o.r.e. What was that man saying?... Insignificant things in order to avoid silence, but to him they appeared to be observations of most profound wisdom. His voice sounded musical and affectionate. Everything about them seemed equally agreeable,--the people who were pa.s.sing through the streets, the Neapolitan sounds at nightfall, the dark seas, the entire life.

They bade each other good-by before the door of the hotel. The count, in spite of his offers of friends.h.i.+p, went away without mentioning his address.

"It doesn't matter," thought Ferragut. "We shall meet again in the doctor's house."

He pa.s.sed the rest of his watch agitated alternately by hope and impatience. He did not wish to eat; emotion had paralyzed his appet.i.te.... And yet, once seated at the table, he ate more than ever with a mechanical and distraught avidity.

He needed to stroll around, to talk with somebody, in order that time might fly by with greater rapidity, beguiling his uneasy wait. She would not return to the hotel until very late.... And he therefore retired to his room earlier than usual, believing with illogical superst.i.tion that by so doing Freya might arrive earlier.

His first movement upon finding himself alone in his room, was one of pride. He looked up at the ceiling, pitying the enamored sailor that a week before had been dwelling on the floor above. Poor man! How they must have made fun of him!... Ulysses admired himself as though he were an entirely new personality, happy and triumphant, completely separated from that other creature by dolorous periods of humiliations and failures that he did not wish to recall.

The long, long hours in which he waited with such anxiety!... He strolled about smoking, lighting one cigar with the remnant of the preceding one. Then he opened the window, wis.h.i.+ng to get rid of the perfume of strong tobacco. She only liked Oriental cigarettes.... And as the acrid odor of the strong, succulent Havana cigar persisted in the room, he searched in his dressing-case and sprinkled around the contents of various perfumed essences which he had long ago forgotten.

A sudden uneasiness disturbed his waiting. Perhaps she who was going to come did not know which was his room. He was not sure that he had given her the directions with sufficient clearness. It was possible that she might make a mistake.... He began to believe that really she had made a mistake.

Fear and impatience made him open his door, taking his stand in the corridor in order to look down toward Freya's closed room. Every time that footsteps sounded on the stairway or the grating of the elevator creaked, the bearded sailor trembled with a childish uneasiness. He wanted to hide himself and yet at the same time he wanted to look to see if she was the one who was coming.

The guests occupying the same floor kept seeing him withdraw into his room in the most inexplicable att.i.tudes. Sometimes he would remain firmly in the corridor as though, worn out with useless calling, he were looking for the domestics; and at other times they surprised him with his head poking out of the half-open door or hastily withdrawing it. An old Italian count, pa.s.sing by, gave him a smile of intelligence and comrades.h.i.+p.... He was in the secret! The man was undoubtedly waiting for one of the maids of the hotel.

He ended by settling himself in his room, but leaving his door ajar.

The rectangle of bright light that it marked on the floor and wall opposite would guide Freya, showing her the way....

But he was not able to keep up this signal very long. Scantily clad dames in kimonos and gentlemen in pyjamas were slipping discreetly down the pa.s.sage way in soft, slipper-clad silence, all going in the same direction, and casting wrathful glances toward the lighted doorway.

Finally he had to close the door. He opened a book, but it was impossible to read two paragraphs consecutively. His watch said twelve o'clock.

"She will not come!... She will not come!" he cried in desperation.

A new idea revived his drooping spirits. It was ridiculous that so discreet a person as Freya should venture to come to his room while there was a light under the door. Love needed obscurity and mystery.

And besides, this visible hope might attract the notice of some curious person.

He snapped off the electric light and in the darkness found his bed, throwing himself down with an exaggerated noise, in order that n.o.body might doubt that he had retired for the night. The darkness reanimated his hope.

"She's going to come.... She will come at any moment."

Again he arose cautiously, noiselessly, going on tiptoe. He must overcome any possible difficulty at the entrance. He put the door slightly ajar so as to avoid the swinging noise of the door-fastening.

A chair in the frame of the doorway easily held it unlatched.

He got up several times more, arranging things to his satisfaction and then threw himself upon the bed, disposed to keep his watch all night, if it was necessary. He did not wish to sleep. No, he ought not to drowse.... And half an hour later he was slumbering profoundly without knowing at what moment he had slid down the soft slopes of sleep.

Suddenly he awoke as if some one had hit his head with a club. His ears were buzzing.... It was the rude impression of one who sleeps without wis.h.i.+ng to and feels himself shaken by reviving restlessness. Some moments pa.s.sed without his taking in the situation. Then he suddenly recalled it all.... Alone! She had not come!... He did not know whether minutes or hours had pa.s.sed by.

Something besides his uneasiness had brought him back to life. He suspected that in the dark silence some real thing was approaching. A little mouse appeared to be moving down the corridor. The shoes placed outside one of the doors were moved with a slight creaking. Ferragut had the vague impression of air that is displaced by the slow advance of a body.

The door trembled. The chair was pushed back, little by little, very gently pushed. In the darkness he descried a moving shadow, dark and dense. He made a movement.

"Shhhh-h!" sighed a ghostly voice, a voice from the other world. "It is I."

Instinctively he raised his right hand to the wall and turned on the light.

Under the electric light it was she,--a different Freya from any that he had ever seen, with her wealth of hair falling in golden serpents over her shoulders covered with an Asiatic tunic that enveloped her like a cloud.

It was not the j.a.panese kimono, vulgarized by commerce. It was made in one piece of Hindustanic cloth, embroidered with fantastic flowers and capriciously draped. Through its fine texture could be perceived the flesh as though it were a wrapping of multicolored air.

She uttered a protest. Then, imitating Ulysses' gesture, she reached her hand toward the wall ... and all was darkness.

Upon awakening, he felt the sunlight on his face. The window, whose curtains he had forgotten to draw, was blue,--blue sky above and the blue of the sea in its lower panes.

He looked around him.... n.o.body! For a moment he believed he must have been dreaming, but the sweet perfume of her hair still scented the pillow. The reality of awakening was as joyous for Ulysses, as sweet as had been the night hours in the mystery of the darkness. He had never felt so strong and so happy.

In the window sounded a baritone voice singing one of the songs of Naples,--"Oh, sweet land, sweet gulf!..." That certainly was the most beautiful spot in the world. Proud and satisfied with his fate, he would have liked to embrace the waves, the islands, the city, Vesuvius.

A bell jangled impatiently in the corridor. Captain Ferragut was hungry. He surveyed with the glance of an ogre the _cafe au lait_, the abundant bread, and the small pat of b.u.t.ter that the waiter brought him. A very small portion for him!... And while he was attacking all this with avidity, the door opened and Freya, rosy and fresh from a recent bath and clad like a man, entered the room.

The Hindu tunic had been replaced with masculine pyjamas of violet silk. The pantaloons had the edges turned up over a pair of white Turkish slippers into which were tucked her bare feet. Over her heart there was embroidered a design whose letters Ulysses was not able to decipher. Above this device the point of her handkerchief was sticking out of the pocket. Her opulent hair, twisted on top of her head and the voluptuous curves that the silk was taking in certain parts of her masculine attire were the only things that announced the woman.

The captain forgot his breakfast, enthusiastic over this novelty. She was a second Freya,--a page, an adorable, freakish novelty.... But she repelled his caresses, obliging him to seat himself.

She had entered with a questioning expression in her eyes. She was feeling the disquietude of every woman on her second amorous interview.

She was trying to guess his impressions, to convince herself of his grat.i.tude, to be certain that the fascinations of the first hours had not been dissipated during her absence.

While the sailor was again attacking his breakfast with the familiarity of a lover who has achieved his ends and no longer needs to hide and poetize his grosser necessities, she seated herself on an old _chaise longue_, lighting a cigarette.

She cuddled into this seat, her crossed legs forming an angle within the circle of one of her arms. Then she leaned her head on her knees, and in this position smoked a long time, with her glance fixed on the sea. He guessed that she was about to say something interesting, something that was puckering her mental interior, struggling to come out.

Finally she spoke with deliberation, without taking her eyes off the gulf. From time to time she would stop this contemplation in order to fasten her eyes on Ulysses, measuring the effect of her words. He stopped occupying himself definitely with the breakfast tray, foreseeing that something very important was coming.

"You have sworn that you will do for me whatever I ask you to do....

You do not wish to lose me forever."

Ulysses protested. Lose her?... He could not live without her.

"I know your former life; you have told me all about it.... You know nothing about me and you ought to know about me--now that I am really yours."