nk every drop," she commanded: "it will
give you courage. You had better be a little tipsy than fainting away.
And put this bottle into your pocket to drink when you have need on
the way."

More dead than alive, Silvia was placed in the little old-fashioned
carriage that Matteo had hired to come to Rome in, and her brother
took his seat beside her. The Signora Fantini and her daughter leaned
from the window, kissing their hands to her and shaking their
handkerchiefs as long as she was in sight. And as long as she was in
sight they saw her pale face turned backward, looking at them. Then
the tawny stone of a church-corner hid her from their eyes for ever.

Who knows or can guess what that drive was? The two passed through
Frascati, and Matteo stopped to speak to an acquaintance there. They
drove around Monte Porzio, and Matteo stopped again, to buy a glass of
wine and some figs. He offered some to his sister, but she shook her
head.

"She is sleepy," her brother said to the man of whom he had bought.
"Give me another tumbler of wine: it isn't bad."

"It is the last barrel I have of the vintage of two years ago," the
man replied. "It was a good vintage. If the signorina would take a
drop she would sleep the better. Besides, the night is coming on and
there is a chill in the air."

Silvia opened her eyes and made the little horizontal motion with her
forefinger which in Italy means no.

"She will sleep well enough," Matteo said, and drove on.

Night was coming on, and they had no more towns to pass--only a bit
more of lonely level road and the lonely road that wound to and fro up
the mountain-side. At the best, they could not reach home before ten
o'clock. The road went to and fro--sometimes open, to give a view of
the Campagna and the Sabine Mountains, and Soracte swimming in a
lustrous dimness on the horizon; sometimes shut in closely by trees,
that made it almost black in spite of the moon. For the moon was low
and gave but little light, being but a crescent as yet. There was a
shooting star now and then, breaking out like a rocket with a trail of
sparks or slipping small and pallid across the sky.

One of these latter might have been poor Silvia's soul slipping away
from the earth. It went out there somewhere on the mountain-side.
Matteo said the carriage tilted, and she, being asleep, fell out
before he could prevent. Her temple struck a sharp rock, and Claudio
missed his bride.

He had to keep quiet about