Remembering his peculiar sensitiveness on the subject of his own physical defects, she had avoided mentioning this particular bit of the entertainment; but now that he had touched upon the subject himself, she answered:
"Yes; I did not like that part at all."
"That was the part the people enjoyed most."
"I dare say; and that is just the worst thing about it."
"Because it was inartistic?"
"N-no; it was all inartistic. I meant--because it was cruel."
He smiled.
"Cruel?
Do you mean to the hunchback?"
"I mean---- Of course the man himself was quite indifferent; no doubt, it is to him just a way of getting a living, like the circus-rider's way or the columbine's.
But the thing makes one feel unhappy.
It is humiliating; it is the degradation of a human being."
"He probably is not any more degraded than he was to start with.
Most of us are degraded in one way or another."
"Yes; but this--I dare say you will think it an absurd prejudice; but a human body, to me, is a sacred thing; I don't like to see it treated irreverently and made hideous."
"And a human soul?"
He had stopped short, and was standing with one hand on the stone balustrade of the embankment, looking straight at her.
"A soul?" she repeated, stopping in her turn to look at him in wonder.
He flung out both hands with a sudden, passionate gesture.
"Has it never occurred to you that that miserable clown may have a soul--a living, struggling, human soul, tied down into that crooked hulk of a body and forced to slave for it?
You that are so tender-hearted to everything--you that pity the body in its fool's dress and bells--have you never thought of the wretched soul that has not even motley to cover its horrible nakedness?
Think of it shivering with cold, stilled with shame and misery, before all those people--feeling their jeers that cut like a whip--their laughter, that burns like red-hot iron on the bare flesh!
Think of it looking round--so helpless before them all--for the mountains that will not fall on it--for the rocks that have not the heart to cover it--envying the rats that can creep into some hole in the earth and hide; and remember that a soul is dumb--it has no voice to cry out--it must endure, and endure, and endure. Oh! I'm talking nonsense! Why on earth don't you laugh?
You have no sense of humour!"
Slowly and in dead silence she turned and walked on along the river side.
During the whole evening it had not once occurred to her to connect his trouble, whatever it might be, with the variety show; and now that some dim picture of his inner life had been revealed to her by this sudden outburst, she could not find, in her overwhelming pity for him, one word to say.
He walked on beside her, with his head turned away, and looked into the water.
"I want you, please, to understand," he began suddenly, turning to her with a defiant air, "that everything I have just been saying to you is pure imagination.
I'm rather given to romancing, but I don't like people to take it seriously."
She made no answer, and they walked on in silence.
As they passed by the gateway of the Uffizi, he crossed the road and stooped down over a dark bundle that was lying against the railings.
"What is the matter, little one?" he asked, more gently than she had ever heard him speak. "Why don't you go home?"
The bundle moved, and answered something in a low, moaning voice.
Gemma came across to look, and saw a child of about six years old, ragged and dirty, crouching on the pavement like a frightened animal.
The Gadfly was bending down with his hand on the unkempt head.
"What is it?" he said, stooping lower to catch the unintelligible answer. "You ought to go home to bed; little boys have no business out of doors at night; you'll be quite frozen!
Give me your hand and jump up like a man!
Where do you live?"
He took the child's arm to raise him. The result was a sharp scream and a quick shrinking away.
"Why, what is it?" the Gadfly asked, kneeling down on the pavement. "Ah! Signora, look here!"
The child's shoulder and jacket were covered with blood.
"Tell me what has happened?" the Gadfly went on caressingly. "It wasn't a fall, was it?
No?
Someone's been beating you?
I thought so!
Who was it?"
"My uncle."
"Ah, yes! And when was it?"
"This morning.
He was drunk, and I--I----"