How very slowly the hours passed! If he could only do something to while away the time--pace up and down the room, as he used to do on board, and smoke a cigarette; but that was out of the question.
Hush! was there not a noise somewhere? It must have been outside; and still it seemed to him as if it were in the house itself. Was it a mouse, or some stray cat that had come in unperceived? No; it was a continuous noise, like the trailing of some huge snake on the dry grass.
Silence once more. Now, almost all the town is fast asleep. He would wait a little longer, and then? Well, if Vranic did not come soon, he would not come at all, so it would be useless waiting. He wrapped himself up in his great-coat, for the night was chilly, and had it not been for the thought that Milena had fled with Vranic, sleepiness would have overcome him.
He thoughtlessly began making a cigarette, out of mere habit, just to do something. It was provoking not to smoke just when a few puffs would be such a comfort.
Now he again hears the chimes at a distance; the deep-toned bell rings the four quarters slowly; the vibrations of one stroke have hardly passed away when the quiet air is startled by another stroke. How much louder and graver those musical notes sound in the hushed stillness of the night!
Some towns--Venice, for instance--were all life and bustle at that hour of the night; the streets and squares all thronged with masks and merry revellers; the theatres, coffee-houses, dancing-rooms, were blazing with light, teeming with life, echoing with music and merriment. Budua is, instead, as dark, as lonesome, and as silent as a city of the dead. The whole town is now fast asleep.
"It is useless to wait any longer," mutters Radonic to himself; "nobody is coming."
The thought that his wife had fled with Vranic has almost become a certainty. Jealousy is torturing him. He feels like gripping his throat and choking himself, or dashing his head to pieces against the stone wall. If his house had been in town, near the others, Vranic might have waited till after ten o'clock; but, situated where it was, no prying neighbours were to be feared. Something had, perhaps, detained him. Still, what can detain a man when he has such an object in view?