Then he told Anemone of his father’s house, and how they would marry there and be happy forever after, and of the welcome that his father would give her. And in his vision of their future there, long languid days of summer and beautiful spring-times, and October suns huge, red and mysterious through haze, and gorgeous fires in winter and hunted boars brought home, all blended to build one glory. He told of his mother and Mirandola, and Father Joseph and Peter, and the great dog that he loved, who, as he believed, could have killed a boar alone. A little he told her of hunts that he had had, but told not much of the past, because it seemed to him so bleak when compared with their future. Of the future he told in all its magnificence and so came back to his daydreams. Once she questioned him about his father’s welcome, but his faith in Gulvarez had grown since first he had thought of him, and Gulvarez presided now over all that situation: his father, he said, would surely welcome her. Yet her question brought him back again to the things that are outside daydreams. They had come nearer Aragona now, and its walls shone bright at noon, but with none of the light that shines from happy dreams. Now they must plan. Whither their steps? Aragona first, said Anemone. And then the Tower, said Ramon Alonzo: they could be there that evening. But Anemone besought him for some days at Aragona, now that she had come back to it after all that mist of years, that seemed banked up, impenetrable to her memory, although over them all shone clear the roofs of the old Aragona.
“But in what house?” he asked.
She knew not.
“With whom?”
She cared not.
Aragona, Aragona; the memory of it was in her mind like bells, and she besought some days there.
Then he told her how men waited there for the man with the bad shadow, because of what had happened there on the hill at evening. And he drew his sword as they went towards the village. She laid her hand on the arm that held the sword and made him put it up.
“Not now,” she said. “We will go in the evening late, when shadows are long. And they shall see that your shadow can grow and is as good a shadow as any Christian man’s. Aye, and better; and better. Look at it now on the flowers. Who has a shadow to equal it? And at evening it shall be beautiful, dark and long; and who’ll dare speak of it except in envy?”
And this seemed wise to him, for he could not believe that any prejudice against a man on account of a short shadow could remain when he had a long shadow for everyone to see. So he praised Anemone’s plan and said they would wait. But prejudices die slowly, as they were to find out that evening.
And on the bright hillside they waited, spending the shining hours in happy talk. They had neither food nor water; they had fled too swiftly to have brought provisions away from the house in the wood. But it was the time of year when pomegranates ripen, and a grove of these was near them; and the pomegranates were food and drink to them. Sitting amongst the flowers their talk went on all through the afternoon. There is no memory of what they said. The sound just came to them, from the limits of hearing, of bees in a tall lime; swift insects flashed across the yellow sunlight with sudden streaks of silver; butterflies rested near them, all motionless, showing their splendours; a wind sighed up out of Africa to turn the leaves of a tree; children a long way off called across bright fields to their comrades; the flowers sparkled, and drank the sunlight in; their talk was part of the joy with which Earth greeted the sun.
But when rays slanted and shadows crept afield, and more and more appeared where there had been only sunlight, till multitudes of them were gathered upon the hill, and they seemed to possess the landscape more than the rocks on trees, and Earth seemed populated chiefly with shadows, and even destined for them; then Ramon Alonzo and Anemone, hand in hand, their two dark shadows stretching long behind them, walked confidently into Aragona.
And those who watched espied them. Then bells were rung and men ran out of houses, and there were shouts and musterings; and the murmur arose of a crowd in its agitation, and above the murmur one phrase loud and often: “For the Faith. For the Faith.”
Ramon Alonzo drew near them with Anemone, thinking to satisfy them with the sight of his long shadow, but when they saw it they only cried, “Magic. Magic.” For, having come out from their houses to look for a false shadow, they would not recognize a true one though it lay there for all to see.
Again Ramon Alonzo drew his sword. Without a ring it came from the scabbard and was all leaden to look on and tarnished, not like the bright swords flashing here and there in the crowd, for it had been dulled and disenchanted when it had crossed the lightning-stroke in the hand of the Master. Then Anemone stepped forward before Ramon Alonzo and raised her voice above the sound of the bells and the cry of the crowd for the Faith, till they all stood silent and listened, halted by her bright vehemence.
“No magic,” she said, “no magic; but a young man’s shadow. Watch, and you shall see it grow, as it hath grown ever since noon. See it now fair and shapely. Can magic do this? Who hath a longer shadow? Who hath a shapelier? See how the daisies rest in it. I know what magic can do, but this
