t the balcony. She put
a white hand upon my shoulder and pointed towards great masses of
limestone flushing, as it were, into life. I looked. But first I noted the
sunlight on her face caressing the lines of her cheeks and neck. How can I
describe to you the scene we had before us? We were at Capri----"

"I have been there," I said. "I have clambered up Monte Solaro and drunk
_vero Capri_--muddy stuff like cider--at the summit."

"Ah!" said the man with the white face; "then perhaps you can tell me--you
will know if this was indeed Capri. For in this life I have never been
there. Let me describe it. We were in a little room, one of a vast
multitude of little rooms, very cool and sunny, hollowed out of the
limestone of a sort of cape, very high above the sea. The whole island,
you know, was one enormous hotel, complex beyond explaining, and on the
other side there were miles of floating hotels, and huge floating stages
to which the flying machines came. They called it a Pleasure City. Of
course, there was none of that in your time--rather, I should say,
_is_ none of that _now_. Of course. Now!--yes.

"Well, this room of ours was at the extremity of the cape, so that one
could see east and west. Eastward was a great cliff--a thousand feet high
perhaps, coldly grey except for one bright edge of gold, and beyond it the
Isle of the Sirens, and a falling coast that faded and passed into the hot
sunrise. And when one turned to the west, distinct and near was a little
bay, a little beach still in shadow. And out of that shadow rose Solaro,
straight and tall, flushed and golden-crested, like a beauty throned, and
the white moon was floating behind her in the sky. And before us from east
to west stretched the many-tinted sea all dotted with little
sailing-boats.

"To the eastward, of course, these little boats were gray and very minute
and clear, but to the westward they were little boats of gold--shining
gold--almost like little flames. And just below us was a rock with an arch
worn through it. The blue sea-water broke to green and foam all round the
rock, and a galley came gliding out of the arch."

"I know that rock," I said. "I was nearly drowned there. It is called the
Faraglioni."

"_Faraglioni_? Yes, _she_ called it that," answered the man with
the white face. "There was some story--but that----"

He put his hand to his forehead again. "No," he said, "I forget that
story.

"Well, that is the first thing I remember