Page:In Maremma, by Ouida (vol 2).djvu/292

 from the monasteries on the mountain side and the village churches down the distant shore. The stone doors of the Lucumo's chamber were shut close, but there was no lock or bar, from their inability to make either, and in the stead of those defences they relied on their quick ears and their unceasing apprehension of approach.

But in this early evening hour, as the freshly-lighted heather and pine cones crackled and blazed, and the coldness and the gloom of the wintry night closed in upon the country above them, suddenly she lifted her head and met his eyes fixed on her in angry and suspicious contemplation. She conquered her habit of silence, so long fostered by Joconda, and spoke to him.

'Perhaps it is better you should know;—he who comes from Paris, and who wished me to meet him that other day, is a son of Joconda's nephew, Anton Sanctis. They were poor, but he is rich.'

Then she went on to tell him in her terse and simple diction of the coming of Maurice Sanctis, through the letter of Joconda's dictation written by the public scrivener in Grosseto.