. Children
were playing at the edge of a vineyard. Women were washing linen, men
sitting on the doorsteps mending _nasse_. As she went by she nodded to
them, and bade them "Buona sera." They answered courteously, some with
smiling faces, others with grave and searching looks--or so she thought.

The tunnel that runs beneath the road at the point where this path joins
it came in sight. And still Hermione did not know what she was going to
do. As she entered the tunnel she heard above her head the rumble of a
tram going towards Naples. This decided her. She hurried on, turned
to the right, and came out on the highway before the little lonely
ristorante that is set here to command the view of vineyards and of sea.

The tram was already gliding away at some distance down the road.

A solitary waiter came forward in his unsuitable black into the dust to
sympathize with the Signora, and to suggest that she should take a seat
and drink some lemon water, or gazzosa, while waiting for the next
tram. Or would not the Signora dine in the upper room and watch the
_tramontare del sole_. It would be splendid this evening. And he could
promise her an excellent risotto, sardines with pomidoro, and a bifteck
such as certainly she could not get in the restaurants of Naples.

"Very well," Hermione answered, quickly, "I will dine here, but not
directly--in half an hour or three-quarters."

What Artois was doing at the Ristorante della Stella she was doing at
the Trattoria del Giardinetto.

She would dine quietly here, and then walk back to the sea in the cool
of the evening.

That was her decision. Yet when evening fell, and her bill was paid, she
took the tram that was going down to Naples, and passed presently before
the eyes of Artois. The coming of darkness had revived within her
much of the mood of the afternoon. She felt that she could not go home
without doing something definite, and she resolved to go to the Scoglio
di Frisio, have a cup of coffee there, look through the visitors' book,
and then take a boat and return by night to the island. The sea wind
would cool her, would do her good.

Nothing told her when the eyes of her friend were for an instant fixed
upon her, when the mind of her friend for a moment wondered at the
strange, new look in her face. She left the tram presently at the
doorway above which is Frisio's name, descended to the little terrace
from which Vere had run in laughing with the Marchesino, and stood