As Domini watched her she felt that Irena must have
lived at moments magnificently, that despite her almost shattered
condition and permanent weariness--only cast aside for the moment of the
dance--she must have known intense joys, that so long as she lived she
would possess the capacity for knowing them again. There was something
burning within her that would burn on so long as she was alive, a spark
of nature that was eternally red hot. It was that spark which made her
the idol of the Arabs and shed a light of beauty through her haggard
frame.
The spirit blazed.
Domini put her hand at last into her purse and took out a piece of gold.
She was just going to give it to Irena when the white bundle that was
Hadj made a sudden, though slight, movement, as if the thing inside it
had shivered. Irena noticed it with her half-closed eyes. Domini leaned
forward and held out the money, then drew back startled. Irena had
changed her posture abruptly. Instead of keeping her head thrown back
and exposing her long throat, she lifted it, shot it forward. Her meagre
bosom almost disappeared as she bent over. Her arms fell to her sides.
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