But Ruggiero, plain strong man of the people, hard-handed sailor, was not thinking of any of these things as he sat in his narrow place on the stern behind his master, mechanically guiding the tiller in the latter’s unconscious hand, while he gazed silently at Beatrice’s face, now turned towards him in conversation, now half averted as she looked down or out to sea.  Ruggiero listened, too, to the talk, though he did not understand all the fine words Beatrice and San Miniato used.  If he had never been away from the coast, the probability is that he would have understood nothing at all; but in his long voyages he had been thrown with men of other parts of Italy and had picked up a smattering of what Neapolitans call Italian, to distinguish it from their own speech.  Even as it was, the most part of what they said escaped him, because they seemed to think so very differently from him about simple matters, and to be so heartily amused at what seemed so dull to him.  And he began to feel that the hurt he had was deep and not to be healed, while he reflected that he was undoubtedly mad, since he loved this lady so much while understanding her so little.  The mere feeling that she could talk and take pleasure in talking beyond his comprehension wounded him, as a sensitive half-grown boy sometimes suffers real pain when his boyishness shows itself among men.

Why, for instance, did the young girl’s cheek flush and her eyes sparkle, when San Miniato talked of Paris?  Paris was in France.  Ruggiero knew that.  But he had often heard that it was not so big a place as London, where he had been.  Therefore Beatrice must have some other reason for liking it.  Most probably she loved a Frenchman, and Ruggiero hated Frenchmen with all his heart.  Then they talked about the theatre and Beatrice was evidently interested.  Ruggiero had once seen a puppet show and had not found it at all funny.  The theatre was only a big puppet show, and he could pay for a seat there if he pleased; but he did not please, because he was sure that it would not amuse him to go.  Why should Beatrice like the theatre?  And she liked the races at Naples, too, and those at Paris much better.  Why?  Everybody knew that one horse could run faster than another, without trying it, but it could not matter a straw which of two, or twenty, got to the goal first.  Horses were not boats.  Now there was sense in a boat race, or a yacht race, or a steamer race.  But a horse!  He might be first to-day, and to-morrow if he had not enough to eat he might be last.  Was a horse a Christian?  You could not count upon him.  And then they began to talk of love and Ruggiero’s heart stood still, for that, at least, he could understand.

“Love!” laughed Beatrice, repeating the word.  “It always makes one laugh.  Were you ever in love, mamma?”

The Marchesa turned her head slowly, and lifted her sleepy eyes to look at her daughter, before she answered.

“No,” she said lazily.  “I was never in love.  But you are far too young to talk of such things.”