Maurice looked uneasy.
"I was only saying that I think the sun—the South has an influence," he said, "and that——"
"An influence!" exclaimed Hermione. "Of course it has! Emile, you would have seen that influence at work if you had been with us on our first day in Sicily. Your tarantella, Maurice!"
She smiled again happily, but her husband did not answer her smile.
"What was that?" said Artois. "You never told me in Africa."
"The boys danced a tarantella here on the terrace to welcome us, and it drove Maurice so mad that he sprang up and danced too. And the strange thing was that he danced as well as any of them. His blood called him, and he obeyed the call."
She looked at Artois to remind him of his words.
"It's good when the blood calls one to the tarantella, isn't it?" she asked him. "I think it's the most wildly innocent expression of extreme joy in the world. And yet"—her expressive face changed, and into her prominent brown eyes there stole a half-whimsical, half-earnest look—"at the end—Maurice, do you know that I was almost frightened that day at the end?"
"Frightened! Why?" he said.
He got up from the terrace-seat and sat down in a straw chair.