“I can understand your thinking like that,” Larisa said.
“But all the time my father is cheese-paring where he could expand,” Comte Raoul went on. “I visited our vineyards and farms a little while ago, without his being aware of it, and he is using old-fashioned methods. He will not buy new machinery. He has uneconomical methods of storage. The whole estate could be improved. We need new houses, more workers.”
He spoke vehemently. Then his voice died away.
“What is the point of even talking about it?” he asked.
“The old man will not listen to me.”
“Nurse thought things were perhaps going better this evening,” Larisa said. “I was told Monsieur le Comte had given you a case of his best wine.”
“I asked him for a case,” Comte Raoul said, “not only because I thought it would please him, b
