when her father killed himself. She
was even quite a little lady, up to reading, embroidery, chattering, and
strumming on the piano. And such a coquette too! I saw her arrive with
open-worked stockings, embroidered skirts, frills, cuffs, a heap of
finery. Ah, well! the finery didn't last long!'

He laughed. A big stone nearly upset the gig.

'It will be lucky if I don't leave a wheel in this cursed road!' he
muttered. 'Hold on, my boy.'

The wall still stretched beside them: the priest still listened.

'As you may well imagine,' continued the doctor, 'the Paradou, what with
its sun, its stones, and its thistles, would wreck a whole outfit every
day. Three or four mouthfuls, that's all it made of all the little one's
beautiful dresses. She used to come back naked. Now she dresses like
a savage. To-day she was rather presentable; but sometimes she has
scarcely anything on beyond her shoes and chemise. Did you hear her? The
Paradou is hers. The very day after she came she took possession of it.
She lives in it; jumps out of the window when Jeanbernat locks the door,
bolts off in spite of all, goes nobody knows whither, buries herself in
some invisible burrows known only to herself. She must have a fine time
in that wilderness.'

'Hark, uncle!' interrupted Abbe Mouret. 'Isn't that some animal running
behind the wall?'

Uncle Pascal listened.

'No,' he said after a minute's silence, 'it is the rattle of the trap on
the stones. No, the child doesn't play the piano now. I believe she has
even forgotten how to read. Just picture to yourself a young lady gone
back to a state of primevalness, turned out to play on a desert island.
My word, if ever you get to know of a girl who needs proper bringing up,
I advise you not to entrust her to Jeanbernat. He has a most primitive
way of letting nature alone. When I ventured to speak to him about
Albine he answered me that he must not prevent trees from growing
as they pleased. He says he is for the normal development of
temperaments.... All the same, they are very interesting, both of them.
I never come this way without paying them a visit.'

The gig was now emerging from the hollowed road. At this point the wall
of the Paradou turned and wound along the crest of the hills as far
as one could see. As Abbe Mouret turned to take a last look at that
grey-hued barrier, whose impenetrable austerity had at last begun to
annoy him, a rustling of shaken boughs was heard and a clump of