; with the peasants. I am tired and sick of books, and people,
and reasons. Shall I give you a day of my Heaven?"

Bero smiled and bent slightly forward and rested his hand lightly on the
stick of her parasol, which lay between them. "Go on," he said.

"I would fill my apron with sweet flowers and golden fruit--great
oranges, and those fragrant, delicious tiny mandarins--and I would get
a crowd of little Italians about me, all a-babbling their pretty, pretty
tongue, and I would go down to the bay and get in an anchored boat, and
lie there all the morning, catching the sunlight in my eyes, trimming
the brown babies and the boat with flowers, looking off at the water
and the clouds, tossing the pretty fruit, and laughing, and playing, and
enjoying. Later, there'd be a run on the beach, and a ride on a donkey,
and a dance, with delirious music and frolic. And then the moon and
quiet,--and I would steal away from the crowd, and take a little boat,
and float and drift--"

"Alone?" asked Bero, softly. "Surely, you wouldn't condemn a
mountaineer's yellow moustache, or a soldier's spurs and sword, if at
heart he was really a child of the sun also? May I share your day of
Heaven? It would be paradise for me, too." All this in the same soft,
deferential manner.

"Well, well," half laughed, half sighed Mae. "All this is a dream,
unless, indeed, I go home with Lisetta."

"Who is Lisetta?"

"Our padrona's cousin. She is here on a visit. She lives within a mile
of Sorrento, on the coast. She goes home at the end of Carnival. Oh,
how I do long for Carnival," continued Mae, frankly and confidentially.
"Don't you? I am like a child over it, I am trying already to persuade
Eric--that is my brother--to take me down on the Corso the last night,
for the Mocoletti. It would be much better fun than staying on our
balcony."

"Where is your balcony?" asked Bero, stroking his long moustaches.

"It is on the corner of Maria e Jesu, and if I ever see you coming by, I
shall be tempted to pepper your pretty uniform. How beautiful it is!"

"Yes," replied Bero, again gazing proudly down at his lithe figure, in
its well-fitting clothes, "but I would be willing to be showered with
confetti daily to see you. How shall I know you? What is to be the color
of your domino?" And he bent forward, hitting his spurs against the
paving stones, flashing his deep eyes, and half reaching out his hand,
in that same tender, respectful way.

Mae saw the sun