She shrugged, elevating her brows and glancing around the room, aware that necks were craned here and there, and that some newcomers were staring steadily at her. One of them—a short, stout, bald-headed man in a dress-suit with a wide expanse of shirt-front—kept gazing at her, and after a while at William. He gazed and rubbed the top of his bald head, and then ate—taking large mouthfuls and gulping them down—while he still gazed at her.
Fanchon, seeing it, looked demurely at her plate, toying with her fork. She wanted to laugh, but she remembered her husband’s horror of the sensation she had just made, and she was aware, too, of another figure farther away. She flushed a little, saying nothing, and William, still feeling that little rift in the lute, busied himself filling his wine-glass again.
Fanchon, who had never seen him drink wine, lifted her heavy eyes from her plate to watch him. She knew he had already filled his glass four times.
“He’s not a drinking man,” she thought shrewdly. “He’s unhappy because he’s married me, a dancer!”
William lifted his fifth glass slowly to his lips.
“It’s not bad wine, Fanchon,” he said lightly; “but we had better in Paris.”
She shook her head.
“In Paris you didn’t drink wine, mon ami.”
He reddened.
“Didn’t I? I——” He stopped short.