and, swinging him quickly around, pointed at their taxi-cab. The man in his shirt-sleeves had not even looked at them—it was as if he had known that they would be there.
The hunchback nodded and instantly both of them disappeared—the first man into the side street which had yielded him up, the hunchback into nowhere at all. The incident took place so quickly that it made only an odd visual impression upon Corcoran—he did not have occasion to think of it again until they returned from Capri eight hours later.
The Bay of Naples was rough as they set out that morning, and the little steamer staggered like a drunken man through the persistent waves. Before long Mr. Nosby’s complexion was running through a gamut of yellows, pale creams and ghostly whites, but he insisted that he scarcely noticed the motion and forced Hallie to accompany him in an incessant promenade up and down the deck.
When the steamer reached the coast of the rocky, cheerful little island, dozens of boats put out from shore and swarmed about dizzily in the waves as they waited for passengers to the Blue Grotto. The constant Saint Vitus’ dance which they performed in the surf turned Mr. Nosby from a respectable white to a bizarre and indecent blue and compelled him to a sudden decision.
“It’s too rough,” he announced. “We won’t go.”
Hallie, watching fascinated from the rail, paid no attention. Seductive cries were floating up from below:
“Theesa a good boat, lady an’ ge’man!”
“I spik American—been America two year!”
“Fine, sunny day for go to see Blue Grotte!”
The first passengers had already floated off, two to a boat, and now Hallie was drifting with the next batch down the gangway.
“Where are you going, Hallie?” shouted Mr. Nosby. “It’s too dangerous today. We’re going to stay on board.”
Hallie, half down the gangway, looked back over her shoulder.
“Of course I’m going!” she cried. “Do you think I’d come all the way to Capri and miss the Blue Grotto?”
Nosby took one more look at the sea—then he turned hurriedly away. Already Hallie, followed by Corcoran, had stepped into one of the small boats and was waving him a cheerful good-bye.
They approached the shore, heading for a small dark opening in the rocks. When they arrived, the boatman ordered them to sit on the floor of the boat to keep from being bumped against the low entrance. A momentary passage through darkness, then a vast space opened up around them and they were in a bright paradise of ultramarine, a cathedral cave where the water and air and the high-vaulted roof were of the most radiant and opalescent blue.
“Ver’ pret’,” sing-songed the boatman. He ran his oar through the water and they watched it turn to an incredible silver.
“I’m going to put my hand in!” said Hallie, enraptured. They were both kneeling now, and as she leaned forward to plunge her hand under the surface the strange light enveloped them like a spell and their lips touched—then all the world turned to blue and silver, or else this was not the world but a delightful enchantment in which they would dwell forever.
“Ver’ beaut’ful,” sang the boatman. “Come back see Blue Grotte tomorrow, next day. Ask for Frederico, fine man for Blue Grotte. Oh, chawming!”
Again their lips sought each other and blue and silver seemed to soar like rockets above them, burst and shower down about their shoulders in protective atoms of color, screening them from time, from sight. They kissed again. The voices of tourists were seeking echoes here and there about the cave. A brown naked boy dived from a high rock, cleaving the water like a silver fish, and starting a thousand platinum bubbles to churn up through the blue light.
“I love you with all my heart,” she whispered. “What shall we do? Oh, my dear, if you only had a little common sense about money!”
The cavern was emptying, the small boats were feeling their way out, one by one, to the glittering restless sea.
“Good-bye, Blue Grotte!” sang the boatman. “Come again soo-oon!”
Blinded by the sunshine they sat back apart and looked at each other. But though the blue and silver was left behind, the radiance about her face remained.
“I love you,” rang as true here under the blue sky.
Mr. Nosby was waiting on the deck, but he said not a word—only looked at them sharply and sat between them all the way back to Naples. But for all his tangible body, they were no longer apart. He had best be quick and interpose his four thousand miles.
It was not until they had docked and were walking from the pier that Corcoran was jerked sharply from his mood of rapture and despair by something that sharply recalled to him the incident of the morning. Directly in their path, as if waiting for them, stood the swarthy hunchback to whom the man in the shirt-sleeves had pointed out their taxi. No sooner did he see them, however, than he stepped quickly aside and melted into a crowd. When they had passed, Corcoran turned back, as if for a last look at the boat, and saw in the sweep of his eye that the hunchback was pointing them out in his turn to still another man.
As they got into a taxi Mr. Nosby broke the silence.
“You’d better pack immediately,” he said. “We’re leaving by motor for Palermo right after dinner.”
“We can’t make it tonight,” objected Hallie.
“We’ll stop at Cosenza. That’s halfway.”
It was plain that he wanted to bring the trip to an end at the first possible moment. After dinner he asked Corcoran to come to the hotel garage with him while he engaged an automobile for the trip, and Corcoran understood that this was because Hallie and he were not to be left together. Nosby, in an ill humor, insisted that the garage price was too high; finally he walked out and up to a dilapidated taxi in the street. The taxi agreed to make the trip to Palermo for twenty-five dollars.
“I don’t believe this old thing will make the grade,” ventured Corcoran. “Don’t you think it would be wiser to pay the difference and take the other car?”
Nosby stared at him, his anger just under the surface.
“We’re not all like you,” he said dryly. “We can’t all afford to throw it away.”
Corcoran took the snub with a cool nod.
“Another thing,” he said. “Did you get money from the bank this morning—or anything that would make you likely to be followed?”
“What do you mean?” demanded Nosby quickly.
“Somebody’s been keeping pretty close track of our movements all day.”
Nosby eyed him shrewdly.
“You’d like us to stay here in Naples a day or so more, wouldn’t you?” he said. “Unfortunately you’re not running this party. If you stay, you can stay alone.”
“And you won’t take the other car?”
“I’m getting a little weary of your suggestions.”
At the hotel, as the porters piled the bags into the high old-fashioned car, Corcoran was again possessed by a feeling of being watched. With an effort he resisted the impulse to turn his head and look behind. If this was a product of his imagination, it was better to put it immediately from his mind.
It was already eight o’clock when they drove off into a windy twilight. The sun had gone behind Naples, leaving a sky of pigeon’s-blood and gold, and as they rounded the bay and climbed slowly toward Torre Annunziata, the Mediterranean momentarily toasted the fading splendor in pink wine. Above them loomed Vesuvius and from its crater a small persistent fountain of smoke contributed darkness to the gathering night.
“We ought to reach Cosenza about twelve,” said Nosby.
No one answered. The city had disappeared