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Riccardo
rose to fetch a chair from the next room,
but the Gadfly stopped him. "Don't trouble
about it," he said; "I shall be quite comfortable
here"; and crossing the room to a window beside
which Gemma had placed her chair, he sat down
on the sill, leaning his head indolently back
against the shutter.
As he looked down at Gemma, smiling with
half-shut eyes, in the subtle, sphinx-like way that
gave him the look of a Leonardo da Vinci portrait,
the instinctive distrust with which he inspired her
deepened into a sense of unreasoning fear.
The proposal under discussion was that a pamphlet
be issued setting forth the committee's views
on the dearth with which Tuscany was threatened
and the measures which should be taken to meet
it. The matter was a somewhat difficult one to
decide, because, as usual, the committee's views
upon the subject were much divided. The more
advanced section, to which Gemma, Martini, and
Riccardo belonged, was in favour of an energetic
appeal to both government and public to take adequate
measures at once for the relief of the peasantry.


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