Saint, unwearied, watched his Pool. Not very far off, yet delightfully
remote, lay Naples with its furious activities, its gayeties, its
intensities of sin, of misery, of pleasure. In the Galleria, tourists
from the hotels and from the ships were wandering rather vaguely,
watched and followed by newspaper sellers, by touts, by greedy, pale-
faced boys, and old, worn-out men, all hungry for money and
indifferent how it was gained. Along the Marina, with its huge serpent
of lights, the street singers and players were making their nightly
pilgrimage, pausing, wherever they saw a lighted window or a dark
figure on a balcony, to play and sing the tunes of which they were
weary long ago. On the wall, high above the sea, were dotted the
dilettante fishermen with their long rods and lines. And below, before
each stone staircase that descended to the water, was a waiting boat,
and in the moonlight rose up the loud cry of "Barca! Barca!" to
attract the attention of any casual passer-by.

And here, on this more truly sea-like sea, distant from the great
crowd and from the thronging houses, the real fishermen who live by
the sea were alert and at work, or were plunged in the quiet sleep
that is a preparation for long hours of nocturnal wakefulness.

Hermione thought of it all, was aware of it, felt it, as she sat there
opposite to the open window. Then she looked over to her writing-
table, on which stood a large photograph of her dead husband, then to
the sofa where Vere had been. She saw the volume of Rossetti lying
beside the cushion that still showed a shallow dent where the child's
head had been resting.

And then she shut her eyes, and asked her imagination to take her away
for a moment, over the sea to Messina, and along the curving shore,