oon. He could have had no
prosaic errand there. Was it because he loved the beauty of the scene,
the grace and poetry of the dear young mother with the child, keeping
their watch of centuries, above the old red wall where the lizards sun
themselves? Or had he gone there to say an _Ave_ as the pretty Catholic
custom is?

Another time they had encountered Nanni's boat when they were rowing out
towards San Clemente in the starlight. There were stars in the water as
in the sky, and the city was hidden behind the Giudecca, but the great
_campanile_, showing pale and mysterious in the lights of the Piazza,
sent its white shaft far down into the water of the lagoon on the hither
side of the dark Giudecca. As the shadowy gondola, with its tiny light,
came stealing over the star-strewn water, May recognized the solitary
oarsman. Something withheld her from commenting on the fact, and when, a
few seconds later, Vittorio exclaimed, "_Ecco, mio fratello!_" Uncle Dan
had remarked what quick eyes these fellows have, and that nobody else
could have recognized a man in the dark, like that. And May had said
nothing, and the fact that she had kept silence gave her a curious pang
of unwilling self-consciousness. So she began talking very fast of the
Bellini Madonnas in the church of the Redentore, whose great dome
towered black against the hovering reflection of the city lights, and of
how they were not Bellinis after all, and since experts could make such
bad blunders, whom were you to trust?

[Illustration: "Where the loveliest of all the parasol
Madonnas keeps guard over the
still lagoon"]

They had had no intercourse with Nanni since the day they had rowed out
to the Porto del Lido, and May had protested against the ocean swell.
She often thought of the sensation it had caused in her, and a curious
longing had come over her to feel once more that strange, disconcerting
thrill.

She wondered whether she should ever have a chance to speak to Nanni and
make him the offer of a gondola; she wondered if his face would flash
with pleasure and gratitude. Would he tell her why he had chosen exile
from the life and occupation he loved so well? Would he tell her
something about himself, give her the key to his strange melancholy and
reserve? She had very little hope of such a consummation, but she was
determined to make the attempt at the first opportunity.

And a few days after the Procession at the Canareggio, when he had so
gratefully