And then, where two tall cypresses stood upon either side, Jenny
and Assunta found the shrine and stayed a while. Jenny set down the
basket which she carried with their midday meal, and her companion
dropped the great bin destined to hold mulberry leaves.
The lake below was now reduced to a cup of liquid jade over which
shot streamers of light into the mountain shadows at its brink; but
there were vessels floating on the waters that held the watchers'
eyes.
They looked like twin, toy torpedo boats--mere streaks of red and
black upon the water, with Italy's flag at the taffrail. But the
little ships were no toys and Assunta hated them, for the strange
craft told of the ceaseless battle waged by authority against the
mountain smugglers and reminded the widow of her own lawless
husband's death ten years before. Caesar Marzelli had taken his cup
to the well once too often and had lost his life in a pitched battle
with the officers of the customs.
Long shafts of glory shot between the mountains and drenched the
lake; the shoulders of the lesser hills flamed; the waters beneath
them flashed; and far away, among the table-lands of the morning
mist, against a sapphire sky, there gleamed the last patches of
snow.
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