he was happy as the child would be, because of the
sweet, strange air that was blowing about her, and the blossoms that she
could gather into her hand, so rare, so wonderful, and yet withal so
familiar, because they _were_ blossoms.

With her fingers buried in her curls, with her book on her knee, with the
moon rays white and strong on the page, Bebee sat entranced as the hours
went by; the children's play shouts died away; the babble of the gossip
at the house doors ceased; people went by and called good night to her;
the little huts shut up one by one, like the white and purple convolvulus
cups in the hedges.

Bebee did not stir, nor did she hear them; she was deaf even to the
singing of the nightingales in the willows, where she sat in her little
thatch above, and the wet garden-ways beyond her.

A heavy step came tramping down the lane. A voice called to her,--

"What are you doing, Bebee, there, this time of the night? It is on the
strike of twelve."

She started as if she were doing some evil thing, and stretched her arms
out, and looked around with blinded, wondering eyes, as if she had been
rudely wakened from her sleep.

"What are you doing up so late?" asked Jeannot; he was coming from the
forest in the dead of night to bring food for his family; he lost his
sleep thus often, but he never thought that he did anything except his
duty in those long, dark, tiring tramps to and fro between Soignies and
Laeken.

Bebee shut her book and smiled with dreaming eyes, that saw him not at
all.

"I was reading--and, Jeannot, his name is Flamen for the world, but I may
call him Victor."

"What do I care for his name?"

"You asked it this morning."

"More fool I. Why do you read? Reading is not for poor folk like you and
me."

Bebee smiled up at the white clear moon that sailed above the woods.

She was not awake out of her dream. She
only dimly heard the words he spoke.

"You are a little peasant," said Jeannot roughly, as he paused at the
gate. "It is all you can do to get your bread. You have no one to stand
between you and hunger. How will it be with you when the slug gets your
roses, and the snail your carnations, and your hens die of damp, and your
lace is all wove awry, because your head runs on reading and folly, and
you are spoilt for all simple pleasures and for all honest work?"

She smiled, still looking up at the moon, with the dropping ivy touching
her hair.

"You are cross, dear Jeannot.