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Words: 79244 in 44 pages
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TO WIN THE LOVE HE SOUGHT
THE MEETING
The soft mantle of a southern twilight had fallen upon land and sea, and the heart of the Palermitans was glad. Out they trooped into the scented darkness, strolling along the promenade in little groups, listening to the band, drinking in the cool night breeze from the sea, singling out friends, laughing, talking, flirting, and passing on. A long line of carriages was drawn up along the Marina, and many of the old Sicilian aristocracy were mingling with the crowd.
The terrace of the Hotel de l'Europe extends to the very verge of the promenade, and, night by night, is crowded with men of all conditions and nations, who sit before little marble tables facing the sea, smoking and drinking coffee and liqueurs. At one of these, so close to the promenade that the dresses of the passers-by almost touched them, two men were seated.
One was of an order and race easily to be distinguished in any quarter of the globe--an English country gentleman. There was no possibility of any mistake about him. Saxon was written in his face, in the cut of his clothes; even his attitude betrayed it. He was tall and handsome, and young enough not to have outlived enthusiasm, for he was looking out upon the gay scene with keen interest. His features were well cut, his eyes were blue, and his bronze face was smooth, save for a slight, well-formed moustache. He wore a brown tweed coat and waistcoat, flannel trousers, a straw hat tilted over his eyes, and he was smoking a briar pipe, with his hands in his pockets, and his feet resting upon the stone work.
They were only acquaintances, these two men; chance had brought them together for some evil purpose of her own. When the Englishman, who, unlike most of his compatriots, was a young man of a sociable turn of mind, and detested solitude, had come across him a few minutes ago in the long, low dining-room of the hotel, and had proposed their sharing a table and their coffee outside, the other would have refused if he could have done so with courtesy. As that had been impossible, he had yielded, however, and they had become for a while companions, albeit silent ones.
The Englishman was in far too good a humor with himself, the place, and his surroundings, to hold his peace for long. He exchanged his pipe for a Havana, and commenced to talk.
"I say, this is an awfully jolly place! No idea it was anything like it. I'm glad I came!"
"You don't live here, do you?" he asked.
The Sicilian shook his head.
"No! It happens that I was born here, but my home was on the other side of the island. It is many years since I visited it."
He had made a longer speech than he had intended, and he paid the penalty for it. The Englishman drew his chair a little nearer, and continued with an air of increasing familiarity.
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