"
"You mean by trying to defy the Divine Will?" said Domini.
"Exactly, Mademoiselle."
She thought of her dead father.
The servants stole round the table, handing various dishes noiselessly.
One of them, at this moment, poured red wine into Androvsky's glass. He
uttered a low exclamation that sounded like the beginning of a protest
hastily checked.
"You prefer white wine?" said Count Anteoni.
"No, thank you, Monsieur."
He lifted the glass to his lips and drained it.
"Are you a judge of wine?" added the Count. "That is made from my own
grapes. I have vineyards near Tunis."
"It is excellent," said Androvsky.
Domini noticed that he spoke in a louder voice than usual, as if he were
making a determined effort to throw off the uneasiness that evidently
oppressed him. He ate heartily, choosing almost ostentatiously dishes
in which there was meat. But everything that he did, even this eating
of meat, gave her the impression that he was--subtly, how she did not
know--defying not only the priest, but himself. Now and then she glanced
across at him, and when she did so he was always looking away from
her.
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