separated by broad causeways,
were three mirrors showing different reflections, the waters of which
flowed from one to another in melodious cascades. These causeways were
used to go from lake to lake without passing round the shores. From the
chalet could be seen, through a vista among the trees, the thankless
waste of the chalk commons, resembling an open sea and contrasting with
the fresh beauty of the lakes and their verdure.

When Veronique saw the joyousness of her friends as they held out their
hands to help her into the largest of the boats, tears came into her
eyes and she kept silence till they touched the bank of the first
causeway. As she stepped into the second boat she saw the hermitage with
Grossetete sitting on a bench before it with all his family.

"Do they wish to make me regret dying?" she said to the rector.

"We wish to prevent you from dying," replied Clousier.

"You cannot make the dead live," she answered.

Monsieur Bonnet gave her a stern look which recalled her to herself.

"Let me take care of your health," said Roubaud, in a gentle, persuasive
voice. "I am sure I can save to this region its living glory, and to all
our friends their common tie."

Veronique bowed her head, and Gerard rowed slowly toward the island
in the middle of the lake, the largest of the three, into which the
overflowing water of the first was rippling with a sound that gave a
voice to that delightful landscape.

"You have done well to make me bid farewell to this ravishing nature on
such a day," she said, looking at the beauty of the trees, all so full
of foliage that they hid the shore. The only disapprobation her
friends allowed themselves was to show a gloomy silence; and Veronique,
receiving another glance from Monsieur Bonnet, sprang lightly ashore,
assuming a lively air, which she did not relinquish. Once more the
hostess, she was charming, and the Grossetete family felt she was again
the beautiful Madame Graslin of former days.

"Indeed, you can still live, if you choose!" said her mother in a
whisper.

At this gay festival, amid these glorious creations produced by the
resources of nature only, nothing seemed likely to wound Veronique, and
yet it was here and now that she received her death-blow.

The party were to return about nine o'clock by way of the meadows, the
road through which, as lovely as an English or an Italian road, was the
pride of its engineer. The abundance of small stones, laid asid