To Marry a Tiger by Isobel Chace Read Free Book Online Page B

held aloft, sniffing every inch of the path as he went along to see who had been there since the day before. Ruth followed at a more leisurely pace, looking back at the house at intervals, admiring the classical lines of the house behind her.
    She was surprised, when she arrived at the cypress trees, to find herself overlooking the sea. The cliff fell away beneath her, honeycombed with the holes that birds had used for nesting earlier in the summer. Beneath was the deep blue of the sea, edged with white as it broke against the rocks beneath. In a nearby vineyard a man was singing a Neapolitan love song, such as she had heard from her very youth. She smiled to herself with sheer enjoyment, remembering a story that she had once been told about Sicily. The angel Gabriel had been astonished by the beauty of the island. ‘What are you going to do?’ he had asked God. ‘The island is so desirable that everyone will fight over it.’ ‘I shall fill it with Sicilians,’ God had answered.
    The scene was so beautiful that Ruth stopped for a while to look the longer. A fallen tree served as a more than adequate seat and Saro, who had apparently adopted her as a more or less permanent companion, ran in and out of the trees, returning to her at intervals for a few words of admiration and approval.
    Henry Brett had found her name apt the day before, she remembered. But she had no desire to weep. She was not in the least homesick. But there was, she thought, something in the poem that struck a chord. She began to recite it softly to herself, to see what it sounded like, away from the classroom, in surroundings that were made for such cadences.
    Thou wast not born for death, immortal Bird!
    No hungry generations tread thee down;
    The voice I hear this passing night was heard
    In ancient days by emperor and clown!
    Perhaps the self-same song that found a path
    Through the sad heart of Ruth, when, sick for home,
    She stood in tears amid the alien corn;
    The same that oft times hath
    Charmed magic casements, opening on the foam
    Of perilous seas, in faery lands forlorn.
    There was no nightingale, not at that hour of the morning, and Ruth couldn’t honestly say that she felt in the least bit alien, but the magic casements were there before her, and the perilous seas she could feel in her very blood. Perhaps the choice was apter than Henry Brett had known.
    She turned as she heard hurrying footsteps coming up the path and went to meet Giulia, cross and panting, as she came towards her.
    “The Signor is angry because you have not had breakfast!” the Italian woman said furiously. “In England you would have eaten egg and bacon— many things—and he says you must have the same here!”
    Ruth blinked. “But I never eat breakfast!” she objected.
    “Then you had better tell Signor Verdecchio so yourself!” Giulia insisted grimly.
    Ruth chuckled. “I’m afraid I’m being a great nuisance to you,” she apologised.
    Giulia gave her a sudden smile. “It is no trouble for me, but,” she added with a shake of her head, “it is trouble for you! The Signor’s aunt will be with us for lunch, now that her friend has died. She will not expect to find you here.”
    But she would, Ruth thought. She knew all about her! And when she came, she would sort out the whole situation and Ruth would go back to England.
    But she couldn’t help wondering why the thought gave her so little pleasure.

 
    CHAPTER FOUR
    RUTH succeeded in avoiding Mario all day. Signora Verdecchio had not turned up at lunchti m e after all. Ruth had looked for her arrival, but no car had come up the drive to the house and Giulia had resignedly shrugged her shoulders and declared that it was always the same, the Signora had no idea of time, that she scarcely knew that the sun came up in the morning and went down at night.
    At five o clock in the afternoon, she did finally arrive. Ruth could just catch a glimpse of the front door from her bedroom window and she had watched