Page:Daphne, an Autumn Pastoral.djvu/151

 Even while Giacomo was speaking Daphne saw the man slowly approaching, urged on apparently by encouraging gestures from Assunta, who was standing at the corner of the house. A thrill went through the girl's nerves as she saw the rough brown head of the peasant rising above the sheepskin coat that the shepherd-god had worn. Unless miracle had made another like it, it was the very same, even to the peculiar jagged edge where it met in front.

Antoli's expression was foolish and ashamed, but at Giacomo's bidding be began a recital of his recent experiences. The girl strained her ears to listen, but hardly a word of this dialect of the Roman hills was intelligible to her. The gesture wherewith the shepherd crossed himself, and his devout pointing to the sky were all she really understood.

Then Giacomo translated.

"Because he was ill—but the Signorina