For a moment he sat quite still in the glare of the sun, mentally
repeating to himself these words of his wife. So the inevitable had
happened. For he felt it was inevitable. Fate was against him. He was not
to have his pleasure.
"Signorino! Come sta lei? Lei sta bene?"
He started and looked up. He had heard no footstep. Salvatore stood by
him, smiling at him, Salvatore with bare feet, and a fish-basket slung
over his arm.
"Buon giorno, Salvatore!" he answered, with an effort.
Salvatore looked at Maurice's cigarette, put down the basket, and sat
down on the seat by Maurice's side.
"I haven't smoked to-day, signore," he began. "Dio mio! But it must be
good to have plenty of soldi!"
"Ecco!"
Maurice held out his cigarette-case.
"Take two--three!"
"Grazie, signore, mille grazie!"
He took them greedily.
"And the fair, signorino--only four days now to the fair! I have been to
order the donkeys for me and Maddalena."
"Davvero?" Maurice said, mechanically.
"Si, signore. From Angelo of the mill. He wanted fifteen lire, but I
laughed at him. I was with him a good hour and I got them for nine. Per
Dio! Fifteen lire and to a Siciliano! For he didn't know you were coming.
I took care not to tell him that."
"Oh, you took care not to tell him that I was coming!"
Maurice was looking over the wall at the platform of the station far down
below. He seemed to see himself upon it, waiting for the train to glide
in on the day of the fair, waiting among the smiling Sicilian facchini.
"Si, signore. Was not I right?"
"Quite right."
"Per Dio, signore, these are good cigarettes. Where do they come from?"
"From Cairo, in Egypt."
"Egitto! They must cost a lot."
He edged nearer to Maurice.
"You must be very happy, signorino."
"I!" Maurice laughed. "Madonna! Why?"
"Because you are so rich!"
There was a fawning sound in the fisherman's voice, a fawning look in his
small, screwed-up eyes.
"To you it would be nothing to buy all the donkeys at the fair of San
Felice."
Maurice moved ever so little away from him.
"Ah, signorino, if I had been born you how happy I should be!"
And he heaved a great sigh and puffed at the cigarette voluptuously.
Maurice said nothing. He was still looking at the railway platform. And
now he seemed to see the train gliding in on the day of the fair of San
Felice.