l the wild activity of his changing movements Gaspare
never lost his coquettish expression, the look of seductive mischief that
seemed to invite the whole world to be merry and mad as he was. His
ever-smiling lips and ever-smiling eyes defied fatigue, and his young
body--grace made a living, pulsing, aspiring reality--suggested the
tireless intensity of a flame. The other boys danced well, but Gaspare
outdid them all, for they only looked gay while he looked mad with joy.
And to-day, at this moment, he felt exultant. He had a padrona to whom he
was devoted with that peculiar sensitive devotion of the Sicilian which,
once it is fully aroused, is tremendous in its strength and jealous in
its doggedness. He was in command of Lucrezia, and was respectfully
looked up to by all his boy friends of Marechiaro as one who could
dispense patronage, being a sort of purse-bearer and conductor of rich
forestieri in a strange land. Even Sebastiano, a personage rather apt to
be a little haughty in his physical strength, and, though no longer a
brigand, no great respecter of others, showed him to-day a certain
deference which elated his boyish spirit. And all his elation, all his
joy in the present and hopes for the future, he let out in the dance. To
dance the tarantella almost intoxicated him, even when he only danced it
in the village among the contadini, but to-day the admiring eyes of his
padrona were upon him. He knew how she loved the tarantella. He knew,
too, that she wanted the padrone, her husband, to love it as she did.
Gaspare was very shrewd to read a woman's thoughts so long as her love
ran in them. Though but eighteen, he was a man in certain knowledge. He
understood, almost unconsciously, a good deal of what Hermione was
feeling as she watched, and he put his whole soul into the effort to
shine, to dazzle, to rouse gayety and wonder in the padrone, who saw him
dance for the first time. He was untiring in his variety and his
invention. Sometimes, light-footed in his mountain boots, with an almost
incredible swiftness and vim, he rushed from end to end of the terrace.
His feet twinkled in steps so complicated and various that he made the
eyes that watched him wink as at a play of sparks in a furnace, and his
arms and hands were never still, yet never, even for a second, fell into
a curve that was ungraceful. Sometimes his head was bent whimsically
forward as if in invitation. Sometimes he threw his whole body backward,
expos