g sets of rooms opening one after another, till the eye was lost in
them.

"Here, where we now are posed, is your own room, Jacques. For you this
view of Paradise. Monsieur your father will not so readily mount the
stairs, becoming in future years infirm, though now a tree, an oak,
massive and erect. We build for the future, D'Arthenay! Below, then, the
paternal apartments, the salon, perhaps a small room for guns and dogs
and appliances." Another wave set off a square space, where we could
almost see the dogs leaping and crouching.

"Behind again, the kitchens, offices, what you will. A few of these
stones transported, erected; glass, carpets, a fireplace,--the place
lives in my eyes, Jacques! Let us return to the chateau, that I set all
on paper. You forget that I study architecture, that I am a drawsman,
hein? Ten minutes, a sheet of drawing-paper,--pff! Chateau D'Arthenay
lives before you, ready for habitation on the instant."

I saw it all, Melody; I saw it all! Sometimes I see it now, in an old
man's dream. Now, of course, it is wild and misty as a morning fog
curling off the hills; but then, it seemed hardly out of reach for the
moment. Listening to my friend's eager voice, and watching his glowing
face, there came to life in me more and more strongly the part that
answered to him. I also was young; I also had the warm French blood
burning in me. In height, in strength, perhaps even in looks, I was not
his inferior; he was noble, and my fathers had stood beside his in
battle, hundreds of times.

I felt in a kind of fire, and courted the heat even while it burned me.
I answered Yvon, laughing, and said surely I would have no other
architect for my castle. Mlle. de Ste. Valerie joined in, and told me
where I should buy carpets, and what flowers I should plant in my
garden.

"Roses, M. D'Arthenay!" she cried. "Roses are the best, for the masses.
A few gillyflowers I advise, they are so sweet; and plenty of lilies,
the white and yellow. Oh! I have a lily with brown stripes, the most
beautiful! you shall have a bulb of it; I will start it for you myself,
in a stone pot. You must have a little conservatory, too, for winter
plants; one cannot live without flowers, even in winter. All winter,
when no longer many flowers bloom out-of-doors, though always some,
always my hardy roses, then I live half my day in the conservatory. You
shall have some of my flowers; oh, yes, I can spare you plenty."

She was so like her