riest were dwarfed, as if they had come into the presence of a
giant.

The Arabs handed round fruit. And now the song died softly away. Only
the instruments went on playing. The distant tomtom was surely the
beating of that heart into whose mysteries no other human heart could
look. Its reiterated and dim throbbing affected Domini almost terribly.
She was relieved, yet regretful, when at length it ceased.

"Shall we go into the ante-room?" the Count said. "Coffee will be
brought there."

"Oh, but--don't let us see them!" Domini exclaimed.

"The musicians?"

She nodded.

"You would rather not hear any more music?"

"If you don't mind!"

He gave an order in Arabic. One of the servants slipped away and
returned almost immediately.

"Now we can go," the Count said. "They have vanished."

The priest sighed. It was evident that the music had moved him too. As
they got up he said:

"Yes, there was beauty in that song and something more. Some of these
desert poets can teach us to think."

"A dangerous lesson, perhaps," said the Count. "What do you say,
Monsieur Androvsky?"

Androvsky was on his feet. His eyes were turned toward the door through
which the sound of the music had come.

"I!" he answered. "I--Monsieur, I am afraid that to me this music means
very little. I cannot judge of it."

"But the words?" asked the Count with a certain pressure.

"They do not seem to me to suggest much more than the music."

The Count said no more. As she went into the outer room Domini felt
angry, as she had felt angry in the garden at Sidi-Zerzour when
Androvsky said:

"These native women do not interest me. I see nothing attractive in
them."

For now, as then, she knew that he had lied.

CHAPTER XI

Domini came into the ante-room alone. The three men had paused for a
moment behind her, and the sound of a match struck reached her ears
as she went listlessly forward to the door which was open to the broad
garden path, and stood looking out into the sunshine. Butterflies were
flitting here and there through the riot of gold, and she heard faint
bird-notes from the shadows of the trees, echoed by the more distant
twitter of Larbi's flute. On the left, between the palms, she caught
glimpses of the desert and of the hard and brilliant mountains, and,
as she stood there, she remembered her sensations on first entering the
garden and how soon she had learned to love it. It had always seemed to
her a sunny paradise