Chapter 9

Chapter 9

The details of Harriet's crime were never known. In her
illness she spoke more of the inlaid box that she lent to
Lilia--lent, not given--than of recent troubles. It was clear
that she had gone prepared for an interview with Gino, and
finding him out, she had yielded to a grotesque temptation.
But how far this was the result of ill-temper, to what
extent she had been fortified by her religion, when and how
she had met the poor idiot--these questions were never
answered, nor did they interest Philip greatly. Detection
was certain: they would have been arrested by the police of
Florence or Milan, or at the frontier. As it was, they had
been stopped in a simpler manner a few miles out of the town.

As yet he could scarcely survey the thing. It was too
great. Round the Italian baby who had died in the mud there
centred deep passions and high hopes. People had been
wicked or wrong in the matter; no one save himself had been
trivial. Now the baby had gone, but there remained this
vast apparatus of pride and pity and love. For the dead,
who seemed to take away so much, really take with them
nothing that is ours. The passion they have aroused lives
after them, easy to transmute or to transfer, but well-nigh
impossible to destroy. And Philip knew that he was still
voyaging on the same magnificent, perilous sea, with the sun
or the clouds above him, and the tides below.

The course of the moment--that, at all events, was
certain. He and no one else must take the news to Gino. It
was easy to talk of Harriet's crime--easy also to blame the
negligent Perfetta or Mrs. Herriton at home. Every one had
contributed--even Miss Abbott and Irma. If one chose, one
might consider the catastrophe composite or the work of
fate. But Philip did not so choose. It was his own fault,
due to acknowledged weakness in his own character.
Therefore he, and no one else, must take the news of it to Gino.

Nothing prevented him. Miss Abbott was engaged with
Harriet, and people had sprung out of the darkness and were
conducting them towards some cottage. Philip had only to
get into the uninjured carriage and order the driver to
return. He was back at Monteriano after a two hours'
absence. Perfetta was in the house now, and greeted him
cheerfully. Pain, physical and mental, had made him
stupid. It was some time before he realized that she had
never missed the child.

Gino was still out. The woman took him to the
reception-room, just as she had taken Miss Abbott in the
morning, and dusted a circle for him on one of the horsehair
chairs. But it was dark now, so she left the guest a little
lamp.

"I will be as quick as I can," she told him. "But there
are many