er,
in her generous selfishness, that it was for her the wind blew in the
trees, or the fine, gray rain wet the horizon of the avenues; for her,
so that she might say, as she entered the little house of the Ternes,
"It is windy; it is raining; the weather is pleasant;" mingling thus the
ocean of things in the intimacy of her love. And every day was beautiful
for her, since each one brought her to the arms of her beloved.

While on her way that day to the little house of the Ternes she thought
of her unexpected happiness, so full and so secure. She walked in the
last glory of the sun already touched by winter, and said to herself:

"He loves me; I believe he loves me entirely. To love is easier and more
natural for him than for other men. They have in life ideas they think
superior to love--faith, habits, interests. They believe in God, or
in duties, or in themselves. He believes in me only. I am his God, his
duty, and his life."

Then she thought:

"It is true, too, that he needs nobody, not even me. His thoughts alone
are a magnificent world in which he could easily live by himself. But
I can not live without him. What would become of me if I did not have
him?"

She was not alarmed by the violent passion that he had for her. She
recalled that she had said to him one day: "Your love for me is only
sensual. I do not complain of it; it is perhaps the only true love." And
he had replied: "It is also the only grand and strong love. It has its
measure and its weapons. It is full of meaning and of images. It is
violent and mysterious. It attaches itself to the flesh and to the soul
of the flesh. The rest is only illusion and untruth." She was almost
tranquil in her joy. Suspicions and anxieties had fled like the mists of
a summer storm. The worst weather of their love had come when they had
been separated from each other. One should never leave the one whom one
loves.

At the corner of the Avenue Marceau and of the Rue Galilee, she divined
rather than recognized a shadow that had passed by her, a forgotten
form. She thought, she wished to think, she was mistaken. The one whom
she thought she had seen existed no longer, never had existed. It was
a spectre seen in the limbo of another world, in the darkness of a half
light. And she continued to walk, retaining of this ill-defined meeting
an impression of coldness, of vague embarrassment, and of pain in the
heart.

As she proceeded along the avenue she saw coming toward