ver effaced her?
I longed to sleep again so that I might see her; the thought that she
was an illusion, nothing more than the figment of a dream, caused me
great dejection and almost overwhelmed me with hopelessness.

And it took me a very long time to forget her; I loved her, loved her
tenderly, and the thought of her always stirred into life an emotion
that was sweet but sad; and during those moments everything unconnected
with her seemed colorless and worthless. It was love, true love with
all its great melancholy and deep mystery, with its overwhelming but sad
enchantment, love that, like a perfume, endows with a fragrance all it
touches; and that corner of the garden where she had appeared to me
and the old flowerless rosebush that had clasped her in its branches
awakened in me, because of her, agonizing but delicious memories.

CHAPTER LXXVIII.

And again came radiant June. It was evening, the exquisite hour of
twilight. I was alone in my brother's study where I had been for some
time; the window was opened wide to a sky all golden and pink, and I
stood beside it and listened to the martins uttering their shrill cries
as they circled and darted above the old roofs.

No one knew that I was there, and never before had I felt so isolated at
the top of the house, nor more tempted by the unknown.

With a beating heart I opened a volume of De Musset's poems: his Don
Paez.

The first phrases were as musical and rhythmical as if sung by a
seductive golden-voiced siren:

Black eyebrows, snow-white hands, and to indicate the tinyness
Of her feet, I need only say she was an Andalusian countess.

That spring night when the darkness fell about me, when my eyes,
although never so close to the book, could no longer distinguish
anything of the enchanting verses save rows of little lines that showed
gray against the white of the page, I went out into the town alone.

In the almost deserted streets, not yet lighted, the rows of linden and
acacia trees all abloom, deepened the shadows and perfumed the air with
their heavy fragrance. I pulled my felt hat over my eyes and, like
Don Paez, I strode along with a light supple step, and looked up at
balconies and indulged in I know not what little childish dreams of
Spanish twilights and Andalusian serenades.

CHAPTER LXXIX.

Vacation came again, and for the third time we took the journey to
the South, and there in the glorious August and Septembe