stood and read it without being part of
the infatuation myself, without being lost in the sensation. That is
why I saw that glance. They did not know when it began, they did not
know that it was the first. Afterwards they would forget. The urgent
flowering of their hearts would destroy those preludes. We can no more
know our first glance of love than our last. I shall remember it when
they will have forgotten it.

I do not recall my own first glance of love, my own first gift of love.
Yet it happened. Those divine simplicities are erased from my heart.
Good God, then what do I retain that is of value? The little boy that
I was is dead forever, before my eyes. I survived him, but
forgetfulness tormented me, then overcame me, the sad process of living
ruined me, and I scarcely know what he knew. I remember things at
random only, but the most beautiful, the sweetest memories are gone.

Well, this tender canticle that I overheard, full of infinity and
overflowing with fresh laughter, this precious song, I take and hold
and cherish. It pulses in my heart. I have stolen, but I have
preserved truth.

CHAPTER V

For a day, the Room remained vacant. Twice I had high hopes, then
disillusionment.

Waiting had become a habit, an occupation. I put off appointments,
delayed my walks, gained time at the risk of losing my position. I
arranged my life as for a new love. I left my room only to go down to
dinner, where nothing interested me any more.

The second day, I noticed that the Room was ready to receive a new
occupant. It was waiting. I had a thousand dreams of who the guest
would be, while the Room kept its secret, like some one thinking.

Twilight came, then evening, which magnified the room but did not
change it. I was already in despair, when the door opened in the
darkness, and I saw on the threshold the shadow of a man.

. . . . .

He was scarcely to be distinguished in the evening light.

Dark clothing, milky white cuffs from which his grey tapering hands
hung down; a collar a little whiter than the rest. In his round
greyish face I could see the dusky hollows of his eyes and mouth, under
the chin a cavity of shadow. The yellow of his forehead shone
unclearly. His cheekbone made an obscure bar in the dusk. You would
have called him a skeleton. What was this being whose physiognomy was
so monstrously simple?

He came nearer, and his face kindled, assumed life. I saw that he was