“’Tis the first time I’ve seen him like this,” said the good woman.  “This signorina belongs to your own country; she has come to see you,” said she to the old man.

“Mercy!” he cried in a hoarse voice.  “Mercy!  Are you not content?  The leaf I burned.  How did you read it?  But why did you take them both?  Orlanduccio!  You can’t have read anything against him!  You should have left me one, only one!  Orlanduccio—­you didn’t read his name!”

“I had to have them both!” answered Colomba, speaking low and in the Corsican dialect.  “The branches are topped off!  If the stem had not been rotten, I would have torn it up!  Come! make no moan.  You will not suffer long! I suffered for two years!”

The old man cried out, and then his head dropped on his breast.  Colomba turned her back on him, and went slowly into the house, humming some meaningless lines out of a ballata: 

     “I must have the hand
     that fired, the eye that aimed, the heart
     that planned.”

While the farmer’s wife ran to attend on the old man, Colomba, with blazing eyes and brilliant cheeks, sat down to luncheon opposite the colonel.

“What’s the matter with you?” he said.  “You look just as you did that day at Pietranera, when they fired at us while we were at dinner.”

“Old Corsican memories had come back to me.  But all that’s done with.  I shall be godmother, sha’n’t I?  Oh! what fine names I’ll give him!  Ghilfuccio—­Tomaso—­Orso—­Leone!”

The farmer’s wife came back into the room.

“Well?” inquired Colomba, with the most perfect composure.  “Is he dead, or had he only fainted?”

“It was nothing, signorina.  But it’s curious what an effect the sight of you had on him.”

“And the doctor says he won’t last long?”

“Not two months, very likely.”

“He’ll be no great loss!” remarked Colomba.

“What the devil are you talking about?” inquired the colonel.

“About an idiot from my own country, who is boarded out here.  I’ll send from time to time to find out how he is.  Why, Colonel Nevil, aren’t you going to leave any strawberries for Lydia and my brother?”

When Colomba left the farm-house and got into the carriage, the farmer’s wife looked after her for a while.  Then, turning to her daughter: 

“Dost see that pretty young lady yonder?” she said.  “Well, I’m certain she has the evil eye!”