Page:In Maremma, by Ouida (vol 3).djvu/148

 and light around, she recovered her natural spirit; she sat and steered and now and then thrust an oar in the water, that was all. She wanted to make all the haste she could; she longed to be at home again, carrying home good food and the red wine that is man's strength.

She sailed in over the seaweed and the sand of the choked-up bay of Telamone under the shadow of its castle on the rock. She moored her boat hastily and went into the sorry place to try her fortune. The townspeople, such a few as they were, would buy nothing; but there chanced to be there a pedlar who had known her as a child in the house of Joconda. He was one of those who bring goods and news together from the outer world into Maremma, and round whose packs the housewives and the gossips gather eagerly.

He was jovial, and not more unjust than trade makes all traders, great and small. He bought all she had of spun linen at a fair price, and being a man who knew the bigger towns and their tastes, and went about with his merry eyes open, he discerned at a glance the talent and grace of the clay images, and bought them