A Rent In A Cloud

His day’s duties over, Loyd went across to the camp where his friend Stockwell was staying. He brought him back, and the photographs were soon produced.

“My wife,” said Loyd, “wishes to see some of her old Italian scenes. Have you any of those you took in Italy?”

“Yes, I have some half-dozen yonder. There they are, with their names on the back of them. This was the little inn you recommended me to stop at, with the vine terrace at the back of it Here, you see the clump of cypress-trees next the boat-house.”

“Ay, but she wants a little domestic scene at the villa, with her aunt making the morning toilet of her poodle. Have you got that?”

“To be sure I have; and – not exactly as a pendant to it, for it is terrific rather than droll – I have got a storm-scene that I took the morning I came away. The horses were just being harnessed, for I received a telegram informing me I must be at Ancona two days earlier than I looked for to catch the Indian mail, and I was taking the last view before I started. I was in a tremendous hurry, and the whole thing is smudged and scarce distinguishable. It was the grandest storm I ever witnessed. The whole sky grew black, and seemed to descend to meet the lake, as it was lashed to fury by the wind. I had to get a peasant to hold the instrument for me as I caught one effect – merely one. The moment was happy, it was just when a great glare of lightning burst through the black mass of cloud, and lit up the centre of the lake, at the very moment that a dismasted boat was being drifted along to, I suppose, certain destruction. Here it is, and here are, as well as I can make out, two figures. They are certainly figures, blurred as they are, and that is clearly a woman clinging to a man who is throwing her off: the action is plainly that I have called it a ‘Rent in a Cloud’.”

“Don’t bring this to-day, Stockwell,” said Loyd, as the cold sweat burst over his face and forehead; “and when you talk of Orta to my wife, say nothing of the Rent in a Cloud.”