But he returned anon, to make
sure of his mistake, I suppose; while the Jew confronted him with a
defiant glance of his two eyes. They stared at each other for some time in
silence. At last the Moroccan enquired:
"Are you the man who sold me that piece of cloth three weeks ago?"
"I am he."
There was another long pause. Then:
"That new eye: how came you by it?"
The Jew, a dreadful scoffer, pointed heavenwards with one finger.
"A thing of God!" he said. "A miracle has been vouchsafed me."
But the man of Mequinez answered nothing. He gazed at him once more, and
then, slowly bending down his head, folded his hands across his breast in
prayer, and walked away....
Then there is the Polish Count, Count Ponomareff, who arrived four days
ago. He is past middle age, with a drooping moustache and large red nose;
a wistful and woebegone figure, but a brilliant conversationalist, when
the mood is upon him. I have not taken very kindly to the man. Among other
things, he disapproves of flint-collecting; he asks, rather scornfully,
"whether one can sell such stones." And yet, for some obscure reason, he
has singled me out among the men as the object of his favourable notice,
affecting rather a distant manner towards the rest of us; the ladies,
however, are charmed by his courtly graces.
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