This morning he rose much later than usual, and strolled out idly into the spring sunshine, a rug thrown over his shoulder. Often plucking a flower or a leaf, and seeming to examine it with close thoughtfulness, he made a long circuit by the old walls; now and then he paused to take a view of the temples, always with eye of grave meditation. At one elevated point, he stood for several minutes looking along the road to Salerno.

March rains had brought the vegetation into luxurious life; fern, acanthus, brambles, and all the densely intermingled growths that cover the ground about the ruins, spread forth their innumerable tints of green. Between shore and mountains, the wide plain smiled in its desolation.

At length he went up into the Temple of Neptune, spread the rug on a spot where he had been accustomed, each day at noon, to eat his salame and drink his Calabrian wine, and seated himself against a column. Here he could enjoy a view from both ends of the ruin. In the one direction it was only a narrow strip of sea, with the barren coast below, and the cloudless sky above it; in the other, a purple valley, rising far away on the flank of the Apennines; both pictures set between Doric pillars. He lit a cigar, and with a smile of contented thought abandoned himself to the delicious warmth, the restful silence. Within reach of his hand was a fern that had shot up between the massive stones; he gently caressed its fronds, as though it were a sentient creature. Or his eyes dwelt upon the huge column just in front of him—now scanning its superb proportions, now enjoying the hue of the sunny-golden travertine, now observing the myriad crevices of its time-eaten surface, the petrified forms of vegetable growth, the little pink snails that housed within its chinks.

It was not an artistic impulse only that had brought Mallard to Italy, after three years of work under northern skies. He wished to convince himself that his freedom was proof against memories revived on the very ground where he had suffered so intensely. He had put aside repeated invitations from the Spences, because of the doubt whether he could trust himself within sight of the Mediterranean. Liberty from oppressive thought he had long recovered; the old zeal for labour was so strong in him that he found it difficult to imagine the mood in which he had bidden good-bye to his life's purposes. But there was always the danger lest that witch of the south should again overcome his will and lull him into impotence of vain regret. For such a long time he had believed that Italy was for ever closed against him, that the old delights were henceforth converted into a pain which memory must avoid. At length he resolved to answer his friends' summons, and meet them on their return from Sicily. They had wished to have him with them in Greece, but always his departure was postponed; habits of solitude and characteristic diffidence kept him aloof as long as possible.

Evidently, his health was sound enough. He had loitered about the familiar places in Naples; he took the road by Pompeii to Sorrento, and over the hills to Amalfi; and at each step he could smile with contemptuous pity for the self which he had outlived. More than that. When he came hither three years ago, it was with the intention of doing certain definite work; this purpose he now at last fulfilled, thus completing his revenge upon the by-gone obstacles, and reinstating himself in his own good opinion, as a man who did that which he set himself to do. At Amalfi he had made a number of studies which would be useful; at Paestum he had worked towards a picture, such a one as had from the first been in his mind. Yes, he was a sound man once more.

Tempestuous love is for boys, who have still to know themselves, and for poets, who can turn their suffering into song. But to him it meant only hindrance. Because he had been a prey to frantic desires, did he look upon earth's beauty with a clearer eye, or was his hand endowed with subtler craft? He saw no reason to suppose it. The misery of those first months of northern exile—his battling with fierce winds on sea and moorland and mountain, his grim vigils under stormy stars—had it given him new strength? Of body perhaps; otherwise, he might have spent the time with decidedly more of satisfaction and profit.

Let it be accepted as one of the unavoidable ills of humanity—something that has to be gone through, like measles. But it had come disagreeably late. No doubt he had to thank the monastic habits of his life that it assailed him with such violence. That he had endured it, therein lay the happy assurance that it would not again trouble him.

If it be true that love ever has it in its power to make or mar a man, this love that he had experienced was assuredly not of such quality. From the first his reason had opposed it, and now that it was all over he tried to rejoice at the circumstances which had made his desire vain. Herein he went a little beyond sincerity; yet there were arguments which, at all events, fortified his wish to see that everything was well. It was not mere perversity that in the beginning had warned him against thinking of Cecily as a possible wife for him. Had she betrayed the least inclination to love him, such considerations would have gone to the winds; he would have called the gods to witness that the one perfect woman on the earth was his. But the fact of her passionate self-surrender to Reuben Elgar, did it not prove that the possibilities of her nature were quite other than those which could have assured his happiness? To be sure, so young a girl is liable to wretched errors—but of that he would take no account; against that he resolutely closed his mind. From Edward Spence he heard that she was delighting herself and others in a London season. Precisely; this justified his forethought; for this she was adapted. But as his wife nothing of the kind would have been within her scope. He knew him self too well. His notion of married life was inconsistent with that kind of pleasure. As his wife, perhaps she would have had no desire save to fit herself to him. Possibly; but that again was a reflection not to be admitted. He had only to deal with facts. Sufficient that he could think of her without a pang, that he could even hope to meet her again before long. And, best of all, no ungenerous feeling ever tempted him to wish her anything but wholly happy.

Stretched lazily in the Temple of Neptune, he once or twice looked at his watch, as though the hour in some way concerned him. How it did was at length shown. He heard voices approaching, and had just time to rise to his feet before there appeared figures, rising between the columns of the entrance against the background of hills. He moved forward, a bright smile on his face. The arrivals were Edward Spence, with his wife and Mrs. Baske.

All undemonstrative people, they shook hands much as if they had parted only a week ago.

"Done your work?" asked Spence, laying his palm on one of the pillars, with affectionate greeting.

"All I can do here."

"Can we see it?" Eleanor inquired.

"I've packed it for travelling."

Mallard took the first opportunity of looking with scrutiny at Mrs. Baske. Alone of the three, she was changed noticeably. Her health had so much improved that, if anything, she looked younger; certainly her face had more distinct beauty. Reserve and conscious dignity were still its characteristics—these were inseparable from the mould of feature; but her eyes no longer had the somewhat sullen gleam which had been wont to harm her aspect, and when she smiled it was without the hint of disdainful reticence. Yet the smile was not frequent; her lips had an habitual melancholy, and very often she knitted her brows in an expression of troubled thought. Whilst the others were talking with Mallard, she kept slightly in the rear, and seemed to be occupied in examining the different parts of the temple.

In attire she was transformed. No suggestion now of the lady from provincial England. She was very well, because most fittingly, dressed; neither too youthfully, nor with undue disregard of the fact that she was still young; a travelling-costume apt to the season and the country.

"They speak much of Signor Mal-lard at the osteria," said Spence. "Your departure afflicts them, naturally, no doubt. Do you know whether any other Englishman ever braved that accommodation?"

A country lad appeared, carrying a small hamper, wherein the party had brought their midday meal from Salerno.

"Why did you trouble?" said Mallard. "We have cheese and salame in abundance."

"So I supposed," Spence replied, drily. "I recall the quality of both. Also the vino di Calabria, which is villanously sweet. Show us what point of view you chose."

For an hour they walked and talked. Miriam alone was almost silent, but she paid constant attention to the ruins. Mallard heard her say something to Eleanor about the difference between the columns of the middle temple and those of the so-called Basilica; three years ago, such a remark would have been impossible on her lips, and when he glanced at her with curiosity, she seemed conscious of his look.

They at length opened the hamper, and seated themselves near the spot where Mallard had been reclining.

"There's a smack of profanity in this," said Spence. "The least we can do is to pour a libation to Poseidon, before we begin the meal."

And he did so, filling a tumbler with wine arid solemnly emptying half of it on to the floor of the cella. Mallard watched the effect on Mrs. Baske; she met his look for an instant and smiled, then relapsed into thoughtfulness.

The only other visitors to-day were a couple of Germans, who looked like artists and went about in enthusiastic talk; one kept dealing the other severe blows on the chest, which occasionally made the recipient stagger—all in pure joy and friendship. They measured some of the columns, and in one place, for a special piece of observation, the smaller man mounted on his companion's shoulders. Miriam happened to see them whilst they were thus posed, and the spectacle struck her with such ludicrous effect that she turned away to disguise sudden laughter. In doing so, she by chance faced Mallard, and he too began to laugh. For the first time since they had been acquainted, they looked into each other's eyes with frank, hearty merriment. Miriam speedily controlled herself, and there came a flush to her cheeks.

"You may laugh," said Spence, observing them, "but when did you see two Englishmen abroad who did themselves so much honour?"

"True enough," replied Mallard. "One supposes that Englishmen with brains are occasionally to be found in Italy, but I don't know where they hide themselves."

"You will meet one in Rome in a few days," remarked Eleanor, "if you go on with us—as I hope you intend to?"

"Yes, I shall go with you to Rome. Who is the man?"

"Mr. Seaborne—your most reverent admirer."

"Ah, I should like to know the fellow."

Miriam looked at him and smiled.

"You know Mr. Seaborne?" he inquired of her, abruptly.

"He was with us a fortnight in Athens."

As they were idling about, after their lunch, Mallard kept near to Miriam, but without speaking. He saw her stoop to pick up a piece of stone; presently another. She glanced at him.

"Bits of Paestum," he said, smiling; "perhaps of Poseidonia. Look at the field over there, where the oxen are; they have walled it in with fragments dug up out of the earth,—the remnants of a city."

She just bent her head, in sign of sympathy. A minute or two after, she held out to him the two stones she had taken up.

"How cold one is, and how warm the other!"

One was marble, one travertine. Mallard held them for a moment, and smiled assent; then gave them back to her. She threw them away.

When it was time to think of departure, they went to the inn; Mallard's baggage was brought out and put into the carriage. They drove across the silent plain towards Salerno. In a pause of his conversation with Spence, Mallard drew Miriam's attention to the unfamiliar shape of Capri, as seen from this side of the Sorrento promontory. She looked, and murmured an affirmative.

"You have been to Amalfi?" he asked.

"Yes; we went last year."

"I hope you hadn't such a day as your brother and I spent there—incessant pouring rain."

"No; we had perfect weather."

At Salerno they caught a train which enabled them to reach Naples late in the evening. Mallard accompanied his friends to their hotel, and dined with them. As he and Spence were smoking together afterwards, the latter communicated some news which he had reserved for privacy.

"By-the-bye, we hear that Cecily and her aunt are at Florence, and are coming to Rome next week."

"Elgar with them?" Mallard asked, with nothing more than friendly interest.

"No. They say he is so hard at work that he couldn't leave London."

"What work?"

"The same I told you of last year."

Mallard regarded him with curious inquiry.

"His wife travels for her health?"

"She seems to be all right again, but Mrs. Lessingham judged that a change was necessary. Won't you use the opportunity of meeting her?"

"As it comes naturally, there's no reason why I shouldn't. In fact, I shall be glad to see her. But I should have preferred to meet them both together. What faith do you put in this same work of Elgar's?"

"That he is working, I take it there can be no doubt, and I await the results with no little curiosity. Mrs. Lessingham writes vaguely, which, by-the-bye, is not her habit. Whether she is a believer or not, we can't determine."

"Did the child's death affect him much?"

"I know nothing about it."

They smoked in silence for a few minutes. Then Mallard observed, without taking the cigar from his lips:

"How much better Mrs. Baske looks!"

"Naturally the change is more noticeable to you than to us. It has come very slowly. I dare say you see other changes as well?"

Spence's eye twinkled as he spoke.

"I was prepared for them. That she should stay abroad with you all this time is in itself significant. Where does she propose to live when you are back in England?"

"Why, there hasn't been a word said on the subject. Eleanor is waiting; doesn't like to ask questions. We shall have our house in Chelsea again, and she is very welcome to share it with us if she likes. I think it is certain she won't go back to Lancashire; and the notion of her living with the Elgars is improbable."

"How far does the change go?" inquired Mallard, with hesitancy.

"I can't tell you, for we are neither of us in her confidence. But she is no longer a precisian. She has read a great deal; most of it reading of a very substantial kind. Not at all connected with religion; it would be a mistake to suppose that she has been going in for a course of modern criticism, and that kind of thing. The Greek and Latin authors she knows very fairly, in English or French translations. What would our friend Bradshaw say? She has grappled with whole libraries of solid historians. She knows the Italian poets Really, no common case of a woman educating herself at that age."

"Would you mind telling me what her age is?"

"Twenty-seven, last February. To-day she has been mute; generally, when we are in interesting places, she rather likes to show her knowledge—of course we encourage her to do so. A blessed form of vanity, compared with certain things one remembers!"

"She looks as if she had by no means conquered peace of mind," observed Mallard, after another silence.

"I don't suppose she has. I don't even know whether she's on the way to it."

"How about the chapel at Bartles?"

Spence shook his head and laughed, and the dialogue came to an end.

The next morning all started for Rome.

CHAPTER VII
LEARNING AND TEACHING

Easter was just gone by. The Spences had timed their arrival in Rome so as to be able to spend a few days with certain friends, undisturbed by bell-clanging and the rush of trippers, before at length returning to England. Their hotel was in the Babuino. Mallard, who was uncertain about his movements during the next month or two, went to quarters with which he was familiar in the Via Bocca di Leone. He brought his Paestum picture to the hotel, but declined to leave it there. Mallard was deficient in those properties of the showman which are so necessary to an artist if he would make his work widely known and sell it for substantial sums; he hated anything like private exhibition, and dreaded an offer to purchase from any one who had come in contact with him by way of friendly introduction.

"I'm not satisfied with it, now I come to look at it again. It's nothing but a rough sketch."

"But Seaborne will be here this afternoon," urged Spence. "He will be grateful if you let him see it."

"If he cares to come to my room, he shall."

Miriam made no remark on the picture, but kept looking at it as long as it was uncovered. The temples stood in the light of early morning, a wonderful, indescribable light, perfectly true and rendered with great skill.

"Is it likely to be soon sold?" she asked, when the artist had gone off with his canvas.

"As likely as not, he'll keep it by him for a year or two, till he hates it for a few faults that no one else can perceive or be taught to understand," was Mr. Spence's reply. "I wish I could somehow become possessed of it. But if I hinted such a wish, he would insist on my taking it as a present. An impracticable fellow, Mallard. He suspects I want to sell it for him; that's why he won't leave it. And if Seaborne goes to his room, ten to one he'll be received with growls of surly independence."

This Mr. Seaborne was a man of letters. Spence had made his acquaintance in Rome a year ago; they conversed casually in Piale's reading-room, and Seaborne happened to say that the one English landscape-painter who strongly interested him was a little-known man, Ross Mallard. His own work was mostly anonymous; he wrote for one of the quarterlies and one of the weekly reviews. He was a little younger than Mallard, whom in certain respects he resembled; he had much the same way of speaking, the same reticence with regard to his own doings, even a slight similarity of feature, and his life seemed to be rather a lonely one.

When the two met, they behaved precisely as Spence predicted they would—with reserve, almost with coldness. For all that, Seaborne paid a visit to the artist's room, and in a couple of hours' talk they arrived at a fair degree of mutual understanding. The next day they smoked together in an odd abode occupied by the literary man near Porto di Ripetta, and thenceforth were good friends.

The morning after that, Mallard went early to the Vatican. He ascended the Scala Regia, and knocked at the little red door over which is written, "Cappella Sistina." On entering, he observed only a gentleman and a young girl, who stood in the middle of the floor, consulting their guide-book; but when he had taken a few steps forward, he saw a lady come from the far end and seat herself to look at the ceiling through an opera-glass. It was Mrs. Baske, and he approached whilst she was still intent on the frescoes. The pausing of his footstep close to her caused her to put down the glass and regard him. Mallard noticed the sudden change from cold remoteness of countenance to pleased recognition. The brightening in her eyes was only for a moment; then she smiled in her usual half-absent way, and received him formally.

"You are not alone?" he said, taking a place by her as she resumed her seat.

"Yes, I have come alone." And, after a pause, she added, "We don't think it necessary always to keep together. That would become burdensome. I often leave them, and go to places by myself."

Her look was still turned upwards. Mallard followed its direction.

"Which of the Sibyls is your favourite?" he asked.

At once she indicated the Delphic, but without speaking.

"Mine too."

Both fixed their eyes upon the figure, and were silent.

"You have been here very often?" were Mallard's next words.

"Last year very often."

"From genuine love of it, or a sense of duty?" he asked, examining her face.

She considered before replying.

"Not only from a sense of duty, though of course I have felt that. I don't love anything of Michael Angelo's, but I am compelled to look and study. I came here this morning only to refresh my memory of one of those faces"—she pointed to the lower part of the Last Judgment—"and yet the face is dreadful to me."

She found that he was smiling, and abruptly she added the question:

"Do you love that picture?"

"Why, no; but I often delight in it. I wouldn't have it always before me (for that matter, no more would I have the things that I love). A great work of art may be painful at all times, and sometimes unendurable."

"I have learnt to understand that," she said, with something of humility, which came upon Mallard as new and agreeable. "But—it is not long since that scene represented a reality to me. I think I shall never see it as you do."

Mallard wished to look at her, but did not.

"I have sometimes been repelled by a feeling of the same kind," he answered. "Not that I myself ever thought of it as a reality, but I have felt angry and miserable in remembering that a great part of the world does. You see the pretty girl there, with her father. I noticed her awed face as I passed, and heard a word or two of the man's, which told me that from them there was no question of art. Poor child! I should have liked to pat her hand, and tell her to be good and have no fear."

"Did Michael Angelo believe it?" Miriam asked diffidently, when she had glanced with anxious eyes at the pair of whom he spoke.

"I suppose so. And yet I am far from sure. What about Dante? Haven't you sometimes stumbled over his grave assurances that this and that did really befall him? Putting aside the feeble notion that he was a deluded visionary, how does one reconcile the artist's management of his poem with the Christian's stem faith? In any case, he was more poet than Christian when he wrote. Milton makes no such claims; he merely prays for the enlightenment of his imagination."

Miriam turned from the great fresco, and again gazed at the Sibyls and Prophets.

"Do the Stanze interest you?" was Mallard's next question.

"Very little, I am sorry to say. They soon weary me."

"And the Loggia?"

"I never paid much attention to it."

"That surprises me. Those little pictures are my favourites of all Raphael's work. For those and the Psyche, I would give everything else."

Miriam looked at him inquiringly.

"Are you again thinking of the subjects?" he asked.

"Yes. I can't help it. I have avoided them, because I knew how impossible it was for me to judge them only as art."

"Then you have the same difficulty with nearly all Italian pictures?"

She hesitated; but, without turning her eyes to him, said at length:

"I can't easily explain to you the distinction there is for me between the Old Testament and the New. I was taught almost exclusively out of the Old—at least, it seems so to me. I have had to study the New for myself, and it helps rather than hinders my enjoyment of pictures taken from it. The religion of my childhood was one of bitterness and violence and arbitrary judgment and hatred."

"Ah, but there is quite another side to the Old Testament—those parts of it, at all events, that are illustrated up in the Loggia. Will you come up there with me?"

She rose without speaking. They left the chapel, and ascended the stairs.

"You are not under the impression," he said, with a smile, as they walked side by side, "that the Old Testament is responsible for those horrors we have just been speaking of?"

"They are in that spirit. My reading of the New omits everything of the kind."

"So does mine. But we have no justification."

"We can select what is useful to us, and reject what does harm."

"Yes; but then—"

He did not finish the sentence, and they went into the pictured Loggia. Here, choosing out his favourites, Mallard endeavoured to explain all his joy in them. He showed her how it was Hebrew history made into a series of exquisite and touching legends; he dwelt on the sweet, idyllic treatment, the lovely landscape, the tender idealism throughout, the perfect adaptedness of gem-like colouring.

Miriam endeavoured to see with his eyes, but did not pretend to be wholly successful. The very names were discordant to her ear.

"I will buy some photographs of them to take away," she said.

"Don't do that; they are useless. Colour and design are here inseparable."

They stayed not more than half an hour; then left the Vatican together, and walked to the front of St. Peter's in silence. Mallard looked at his watch.

"You are going back to the hotel?"

"I suppose so."

"Shall I call one of those carriages?—I am going to have a walk on to the Janiculum."

She glanced at the sky.

"There will be a fine view to-day."

"You wouldn't care to come so far?"

"Yes, I should enjoy the walk."

"To walk? It would tire you too much."

"Oh no!" replied Miriam, looking away and smiling. "You mustn't think I am what I was that winter at Naples. I can walk a good many miles, and only feel better for it."

Her tone amused him, for it became something like that of a child in self-defence when accused of some childlike incapacity.

"Then let us go, by all means."

They turned into the Borgo San Spirito, and then went by the quiet Longara. Mallard soon found that it was necessary to moderate his swinging stride. He was not in the habit of walking with ladies, and he felt ashamed of himself when a glance told him that his companion was put to overmuch exertion. The glance led him to observe Miriam's gait; its grace and refinement gave him a sudden sensation of keen pleasure. He thought, without wishing to do so, of Cecily; her matchless, maidenly charm in movement was something of quite another kind. Mrs. Baske trod the common earth, yet with, it seemed to him, a dignity that distinguished her from ordinary women.

There had been silence for a long time. They were alike in the custom of forgetting what had last been said, or how long since.

"Do you care for sculpture?" Mallard asked, led to the inquiry by his thoughts of form and motion.

"Yes; but not so much as for painting."

He noticed a reluctance in her voice, and for a moment was quite unconscious of the reason for it. But reflection quickly explained her slight embarrassment.

"Edward makes it one of his chief studies," she added at once, looking straight before her. "He has told me what to read about it."

Mallard let the subject fall. But presently they passed a yoke of oxen drawing a cart, and, as he paused to look at them, he said:

"Don't you like to watch those animals? I can never be near them without stopping. Look at their grand heads, their horns, their majestic movement! They always remind me of the antique—of splendid power fixed in marble, These are the kind of oxen that Homer saw, and Virgil."

Miriam gazed, but said nothing.

"Does your silence mean that you can't sympathize with me?"

"No. It means that you have given me a new way of looking at a thing; and I have to think."

She paused; then, with a curious inflection of her voice, as though she were not quite certain of the tone she wished to strike, whether playful or sarcastic:

"You wouldn't prefer me to make an exclamation?"

He laughed.

"Decidedly not. If you were accustomed to do so, I should not be expressing my serious thoughts."

The pleasant mood continued with him, and, a smile still on his face, he asked presently:

"Do you remember telling me that you thought I was wasting my life on futilities?"

Miriam flushed, and for an instant he thought he had offended her. But her reply corrected this impression.

"You admitted, I think, that there was much to be said for my view."

"Did I? Well, so there is. But the same conviction may be reached by very different paths. If we agreed in that one result, I fancy it was the sole and singular point of concord."

Miriam inquired diffidently:

"Do you still think of most things just as you did then?"

"Of most things, yes."

"You have found no firmer hope in which to work?"

"Hope? I am not sure that I understand you."

He looked her in the face, and she said hurriedly:

"Are you still as far as ever from satisfying yourself? Does your work bring you nothing but a comparative satisfaction?"

"I am conscious of having progressed an inch or two on the way of infinity," Mallard replied. "That brings me no nearer to an end."

"But you have a purpose; you follow it steadily. It is much to be able to say that."

"Do you mean it for consolation?"

"Not in any sense that you need resent," Miriam gave answer, a little coldly.

"I felt no resentment. But I should like to know what sanction of a life's effort you look for, now? We talked once, perhaps you remember, of one kind of work being 'higher' than another. How do you think now on that subject?"

She made delay before saying:

"It is long since I thought of it at all. I have been too busy learning the simplest things to trouble about the most difficult."

"To learn, then, has been your object all this time. Let me question you in turn. Do you find it all-sufficient?"

"No; because I have begun too late. I am doing now what I ought to have done when I was a girl, and I have always the feeling of being behindhand."

"But the object, in itself, quite apart from your progress? Is it enough to study a variety of things, and feel that you make some progress towards a possible ideal of education? Does this suffice to your life?"

She answered confusedly:

"I can't know yet; I can't see before me clearly enough."

Mallard was on the point of pressing the question, but he refrained, and shaped his thought in a different way.

"Do you think of remaining in England?"

"Probably I shall."

"You will return to your home in Lancashire?"

"I haven't yet determined," she replied formally.