and tore it abruptly in two, muttering, 'Muzzi would
if I didn't.' Then he got up and said, 'It's stifling in here. I shall
go out.'

He went out.

Betty, her hand over her shaking lips, muttered, 'Poor Tommy--oh, poor
Tommy! We've no luck at all, he and I.'

She was aware how he must have faced things, and how once more they
stood at the same point.

CHAPTER IX

FURNACE FLAMES

'Ahi quanto a dir qual era e cosa dura
Questa selva selvaggia ed aspra e forte,
Che nel pensier rinnova la paura!
Tanto e amara, che poco e piu morte:
Ma per trattar del ben ch' ivi trovai,
Diro dell' altre cose, ch' io v' ho scorte.'

DANTE.

Beneath the hail of black dust and fiery ashes that blew in gusts from
Vesuvius across the bay, Tommy Crevequer screwed his eyes and tilted his
straw hat forwards and drew, getting an excellent view, if not of
Vesuvius, which was blotted in brown mist, at any rate of the population
who thronged the harbour, and of the way in which they received their
impressions. Foreigners--never-failing game--were much in evidence, a
North German Lloyd having recently arrived; there were also the Sindaco,
and various other celebrities. The artist of _Marchese Peppino_ made
them seem rather funny. It was the first morning after the breaking out
of the eruption, and interest everywhere was vivid. Journalists recorded
their impressions with smarting eyes.

A little way from Tommy, Warren Venables stood, a leaf torn from a
sketch-book thrust beneath his hat to guard forehead and eyes. Tommy had
seen him some time ago; he was rather bored when Venables looked round
and saw him, and strolled towards him.

'Interesting,' said Venables concisely; and Tommy nodded.

Venables half looked over the artist's shoulder, with a careless 'May I
see?'

Tommy shut his notebook with deliberation, and put his pencil into his
pocket. Then, after a moment's interval, he flushed, slowly and with
great completeness.

'You know it's a rotten rag,' he said, hurling down the other's screen
with an angry blow that sent it crashing in pieces.

Venables, looking at his resentment for a moment in silence, said
simply:

'I beg your pardon, Crevequer.'

He, too, had flushed. He was learning, it seemed, the 'insolent
flimsiness' (as Prudence had it) of all his screens, this among the
rest. He wondered for how long Crevequer had known that he 'knew it was
a rotten rag'--or, rather, for how lo