“Islam—­the very word means the surrender of the human will to the will of God,” said Count Anteoni.  “That word and its meaning lie like the shadow of a commanding hand on the soul of every Arab, even of the absinthe-drinking renegades one sees here and there who have caught the vices of their conquerors.  In the greatest scoundrel that the Prophet’s robe covers there is an abiding and acute sense of necessary surrender.  The Arabs, at any rate, do not buzz against their Creator, like midges raging at the sun in whose beams they are dancing.”

“No,” assented the priest.  “At least in that respect they are superior to many who call themselves Christians.  Their pride is immense, but it never makes itself ridiculous.”

“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.  After praising the wine he had relapsed into silence, and Count Anteoni—­she thought moved by a very delicate sense of tact—­did not directly address him again just then, but resumed the interrupted conversation about the Arabs, first explaining that the servants understood no French.  He discussed them with a minute knowledge that evidently sprang from a very real affection, and presently she could not help alluding to this.

“I think you love the Arabs far more than any Europeans,” she said.

He fixed his bright eyes upon her, and she thought that just then they looked brighter than ever before.

“Why?” he asked quietly.

“Do you know the sound that comes into the voice of a lover of children when it speaks of a child?”

“Ah!—­the note of a deep indulgence?”

“I hear it in yours whenever you speak of the Arabs.”

She spoke half jestingly.  For a moment he did not reply.  Then he said to the priest: 

“You have lived long in Africa, Father.  Have not you something of the same feeling towards these children of the sun?”