South Wind | Page 5

on the fourth, to a lovely prospect over
land and sea. They were to meet on this spot; here to exchange gossip,
make appointments for the evening, and watch the arrival of
new-comers to their island. An admirable rule! For it effectively
prevented everybody from doing any kind of work in the morning; and
after luncheon, of course, you went to sleep. It was delightful to be
obliged, by iron convention, to stroll about in the bright sunshine,

greeting your friends, imbibing iced drinks, and letting your eye stray
down to the lower level of the island with its farmhouses embowered in
vineyards; or across the glittering water towards the distant coastline
and its volcano; or upwards, into those pinnacles of the higher region
against whose craggy ramparts, nearly always, a fleet of snowy
sirocco-clouds was anchored. For Nepenthe was famous not only for its
girls and lobsters, but also for its south wind.
As usual at this hour the market-place was crowded with folks. It was a
gay throng. Priests and curly-haired children, farmers, fishermen,
citizens, a municipal policeman or two, brightly dressed women of all
ages, foreigners in abundance--they moved up and down, talking,
laughing, gesticulating. Nobody had anything particular to do; such
was the rule.
The Russian sect was well represented. They were religious enthusiasts,
ever increasing in numbers and led by their Master, the divinely
inspired Bazhakuloff, who was then living in almost complete
seclusion on the island. They called themselves the "Little White
Cows," to mark their innocence of worldly affairs, and their scarlet
blouses, fair hair, and wondering blue eyes were quite a feature of the
place. Overhead, fluttering flags and wreaths of flowers, and bunting,
and brightly tinted paper festoons--an orgy of colour, in honour of the
saint's festival on the morrow.
The Duchess, attired in black, with a black and white sunshade, and a
string of preposterous amethysts nestling in the imitation Val of her
bosom, was leaning on the arm of an absurdly good-looking youth
whom she addressed as Denis. Everyone called him Denis or Mr. Denis.
People used his surname as little as possible. It was Phipps.
With a smile for everyone, she moved more deliberately than the rest,
and used her fan rather more frequently. She knew that the sirocco was
making stealthy inroads upon her carefully powdered cheeks; she
wanted to look her best on the arrival of Don Francesco, who was to
bring some important message from the clerical authorities of the
mainland anent her forthcoming reception into the Roman Catholic
Church. He was her friend. Soon he would be her confessor.

Wordly-wise, indolent, good-natured and, like most Southerners, a
thorough-going pagan, Don Francesco was deservedly popular as
ecclesiastic. Women adored him; he adored women. He passed for an
unrivalled preacher; his golden eloquence made converts everywhere,
greatly to the annoyance of the parroco, the parish priest, who was
doubtless sounder on the Trinity but a shocking bad orator and
altogether deficient in humanity, and who nearly had a fit, they said,
when the other was created Monsignor. Don Francesco was a fisher of
men, and of women. He fished AD MAIOREM DEI GLORIAM, and
for the fun of the thing. It was his way of taking exercise, he once
confessed to his friend Keith; he was too fat to run about like other
people--he could only talk. He fished among natives, and among
foreigners.
Foreigners were hard to catch, on Nepenthe. They came and went in
such breathless succession. Of the permanent residents only the
Duchess, always of High Church leanings, had of late yielded to his
blandishments. She was fairly hooked. Madame Steynlin, a lady of
Dutch extraction whose hats were proverbial, was uncompromisingly
Lutheran. The men were past redemption, all save the Commissioner
who, however, was under bad influences and an incurable wobbler,
anyhow. Eames, the scholar, cared for nothing but his books. Keith, a
rich eccentric who owned one of the finest villas and gardens on the
place, only came to the island for a few weeks every year. He knew too
much, and had travelled too far, to be anything but a hopeless
unbeliever; besides, he was a particular friend of his, with whom he
agreed, in his heart of hearts, on every subject. The frequenters of the
Club were mostly drunkards, derelicts, crooks, or faddist--not worth
catching.
Arriages began to arrive on the scene. That of Don Francesco drove up
first of all. He stepped out and sailed across the piazza like a schooner
before the wind. But his discourse, usually ample and florid as befitted
both his person and his calling, was couched on this occasion in
Tacitean brevity.
"We have landed a queer fish, Duchess," he remarked. "He calls

himself Bishop of Bim-Bam-Bum, and resembles a broken-down
matrimonial agent. So lean! So