ed, 'Oh, how glad I am! how nice of you!
I don't mind telling you now, that I cried over it all night!'

As usual, when they stopped at the entrance gate, the footman took the
wreaths and followed some way behind, while Colette and Paul climbed
in the heat a path made soft by the recent showers. She leaned upon his
arm, and from time to time 'hoped that she did not tire him.' He shook
his head with a sad smile. There were few people in the cemetery. A
gardener and a keeper recognised the familiar figure of the Princess
with a respectful bow. But when they had left the avenue and passed the
upper terraces, it was all solitude and shade. Besides the birds in the
trees they heard only the grinding of the saw and the metallic clink of
the chisel, sounds perpetual in Pere-la-Chaise, as in some city always
in building and never finished.

Two or three times Madame de Rosen had seen her companion glance with
displeasure at the tall lacquey in his long black overcoat and cockade,
whose funereal figure now as ever formed part of the love-scene. Eager
on this occasion to please him, she stopped, saying, 'Wait a minute,'
took the flowers herself, dismissed the servant, and they went on all
alone along the winding walk. But in spite of this kindness, Paul's brow
did not relax; and, as he had hung upon his free arm three or four
rings of violets, _immortelles_, and lilac, he felt more angry with
the deceased than ever. 'You shall pay me for this,' was his savage
reflection. She, on the contrary, felt singularly happy, in that vivid
consciousness of life and health which comes upon us in places of death.
Perhaps it was the warmth of the day, the perfume of the flowers, mixing
their fragrance with the stronger scent of the yews and the box trees
and the moist earth steaming in the sun, and with another yet, an acrid,
faint, and penetrating scent, which she knew well, but which, to-day,
instead of revolting her senses, as usual, seemed rather to intoxicate
them.

Suddenly a shiver passed over her. The hand which lay on the young man's
arm was suddenly grasped in his, grasped with force and held tight,
held as it were in an embrace, and the little hand dared not take itself
away. The fingers of his hand were trying to get between the delicate
fingers of hers and take possession of it altogether. Hers resisted,
trying to clench itself in the glove by way of refusal. All the time
they went on walking, arm in arm, neither speaking nor lo