Under her Tuscan volubility there was also the Tuscan secretiveness. Nobody saw inside her true thoughts. Her mind was like a little locked iron box into which no one could peep. The Tuscan laughs quickly, weeps quickly, rages, fumes, smiles, jumps with joy; seems a merely emotional creature, with his whole heart turned inside out; but in his inmost nature there is always an ego wholly different to that which is shown to others, always a deep reserve of unspoken intents and calculations and desires. It resembles a rosebush all bloom and dew and leaf and sunshine, inside which is made the nest of a little snake, never seen, but always there; sometimes, instead of the snake, there is only a flat stone; but something alien there always is under the carelessly blowing roses. The Tuscan never completely trusts his nearest or dearest, his oldest friend, his truest companion, his fondest familiar; be he gentle or simple, he never gives himself away. The homeliest son and daughter of the soil will always act as though he or she were cognizant of the axiom of the fine philosopher of courts: 'Deal with your friend at all times as though some day he would become your enemy.' Santina, therefore, had told her secret intent to no living soul, and only Caris's old weird mother had been shrewd enough to guess it in the girl's flashing eyes and in her eager questioning of Fate. The house of Massaio was a very busy house, especially so at this season of the year, when the purchasing and fetching and stacking of wood for the coming winter was in full vigour, and all the boys and girls were up in the woods all day long, seeking out and bringing down brushwood and pines and cut heather. Santina with wonderful alacrity entered into the work, although usually she was averse to rough labour, fearing that it would spoil her hands and her skin before she could get to that unknown life of delight which she coveted. But going with the heedless and unobservant children up on the hillsides where the heather and chestnut scrub grew, and farther up still where the tall stone pines grew, she had chances of meeting Caris or of again getting away to his hut unnoticed. He was usually at this season occupied in carrying wood or helping the charcoal-burners, and was now in one place, now in another, as men who have no fixed labour must be. Moreover, her just estimate of her own attraction for him made her guess that this year he would choose to labour nearer the four roads than usual, if he could get employment, and she was in no manner surprised when she saw him amongst a group of men who were pulling at the ropes of one of her uncle's wood-carts, to prevent the cart and the mules harnessed to it from running amuck down the steep incline which led to that green nook at the foot of Genistrello, where the woodman's buildings and sheds were situated.