The women working among the olives below had gone home; there were no sounds from the Marinata road; and the crackling of the fire alone broke upon the stillness--except for a sound which emerged steadily as the silence grew.
It seemed to be a man's voice reading.

Once it was interrupted by a laugh out of all scale--an ugly, miserable laugh--and Lucy shuddered afresh.
Meanwhile Aunt Pattie was whispering to Eleanor.
'He was wonderful--quite wonderful! I did not think he could--' 'He can do anything he pleases.

He seems to be reading aloud ?' 'He is reading some poems, my dear, that she wrote at Venice.

She gave them to him to look at the day she came.

I daresay they're quite mad, but he's reading and discussing them as though they were the most important things, and it pleases her,--poor, poor Alice! First, you know, he quieted her very much about the money.