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Page 21
At the top was a wrought-iron door, and through it shone a flood
of electric light.
"Ecco," said Domenico, lithely running up the last few steps
ahead and pushing the door open.
And there they were, arrived; and it was San Salvatore; and their
suit-cases were waiting for them; and they had not been murdered.
They looked at each other's white faces and blinking eyes very
solemnly.
It was a great, a wonderful moment. Here they were, in their
mediaeval castle at last. Their feet touched its stones.
Mrs. Wilkins put her arm round Mrs. Arbuthnot's neck and kissed
her.
"The first thing to happen in this house," she said softly,
solemnly, "shall be a kiss."
"Dear Lotty," said Mrs. Arbuthnot.
"Dear Rose," said Mrs. Wilkins, her eyes brimming with gladness.
Domenico was delighted. He liked to see beautiful ladies kiss.
He made them a most appreciative speech of welcome, and they stood arm
in arm, holding each other up, for they were very tired, blinking
smilingly at him, and not understanding a word.
Chapter 6
When Mrs. Wilkins woke next morning she lay in bed a few minutes
before getting up and opening the shutters. What would she see out of
her window? A shining world, or a world of rain? But it would be
beautiful; whatever it was would be beautiful.
She was in a little bedroom with bare white walls and a stone
floor and sparse old furniture. The beds--there were two--were made of
iron, enameled black and painted with bunches of gay flowers. She lay
putting off the great moment of going to the window as one puts off
opening a precious letter, gloating over it. She had no idea what time
it was; she had forgotten to wind up her watch ever since, centuries
ago, she last went to bed in Hampstead. No sounds were to be heard in
the house, so she supposed it was very early, yet she felt as if she
had slept a long while--so completely rested, so perfectly content.
She lay with her arms clasped round her head thinking how happy she
was, her lips curved upwards in a delighted smile. In bed by herself:
adorable condition. She had not been in a bed without Mellersh once now
for five whole years; and the cool roominess of it, the freedom of
one's movements, the sense of recklessness, of audacity, in giving the
blankets a pull if one wanted to, or twitching the pillows more
comfortably! It was like the discovery of an entirely new joy.
Mrs. Wilkins longed to get up and open the shutters, but where
she was was really so very delicious. She gave a sigh of contentment,
and went on lying there looking round her, taking in everything in her
room, her own little room, her very own to arrange just as she pleased
for this one blessed month, her room bought with her own savings, the
fruit of her careful denials, whose door she could bolt if she wanted
to, and nobody had the right to come in. It was such a strange little
room, so different from any she had known, and so sweet. It was like a
cell. Except for the two beds, it suggested a happy austerity. "And
the name of the chamber," she thought, quoting and smiling round at it,
"was Peace."
Well, this was delicious, to lie there thinking how happy she
was, but outside those shutters it was more delicious still. She
jumped up, pulled on her slippers, for there was nothing on the stone
floor but one small rug, ran to the window and threw open the shutters.
"Oh!" cried Mrs. Wilkins.
All the radiance of April in Italy lay gathered together at her
feet. The sun poured in on her. The sea lay asleep in it, hardly
stirring. Across the bay the lovely mountains, exquisitely different
in colour, were asleep too in the light; and underneath her window, at
the bottom of the flower-starred grass slope from which the wall of the
castle rose up, was a great cypress, cutting through the delicate blues
and violets and rose-colours of the mountains and the sea like a great
black sword.
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