Page:Nostromo (1904).djvu/87

 of leave-taking to remark to Mrs. Gould, in a low, confidential mutter, "This marks an epoch."

Mrs. Gould loved the patio of her Spanish house. A broad flight of stone steps was overlooked silently from a niche in the wall by a Madonna in blue robes with the crowned child sitting on her arm. Subdued voices ascended in the early mornings from the paved well of the quadrangle, with the stamping of horses and mules led out in pairs to drink at the cistern. A tangle of slender bamboo stems drooped its narrow, bladelike leaves over the square pool of water, and the fat coachman sat muffled up on the edge, holding lazily the ends of halters in his hand. Barefooted servants passed to and fro, issuing from dark, low doorways below, two laundry girls with baskets of washed linen, the baker with the tray of bread made for the day, Leonarda—her own camerista—bearing high up, swung from her hand raised above her raven black head a bunch of starched underskirts dazzlingly white in the slant of sunshine. Then the old porter would hobble in, sweeping the flag-stones, and the house was ready for the day. All the lofty rooms on the three sides of the quadrangle opened into each other and into the corrédor, with its wrought-iron railings and a border of flowers, whence, like the lady of the mediæval castle, she could witness from above all the departures and arrivals of the casa, to which the sonorous arched gateway lent an air of stately importance.

She had watched her carriage roll away with the three guests from the north. She smiled. Their three arms went up simultaneously to their three hats. Captain Mitchell, the fourth, in attendance, had already