“The monk’s liqueur, Madame?”
“What do you mean—monk’s liqueur?”
“It was invented by a monk, Madame, and is sold by the monks of El-Largani.”
“Oh! Have we any more of it?”
“There is another bottle, Madame, but I should not dare to bring it if——”
He paused.
“If what, Ouardi?”
“If Monsieur were there.”
Domini was on the point of asking him why, but she checked herself and told him to leave her. Then she walked up and down once more on the sand. She was thinking now of the broken glass on the ground at Androvsky’s feet when she found him alone in the tent after De Trevignac had gone. Ouardi’s words made her wonder whether this liqueur, brought to celebrate De Trevignac’s presence in the camp, had turned the conversation upon the subject of the religious orders; whether Androvsky had perhaps said something against them which had offended De Trevignac, a staunch Catholic; whether there had been a quarrel between the two men on the subject of religion. It was possible. She remembered De Trevignac’s strange, almost mystical, gesture in the dawn, following his look of horror towards the tent where her husband lay sleeping.
To-night her mind—her whole nature—felt terribly alive.