the jet from the
fountain basin swerved, and a mellow raining sound of drops swept the
still pool. The lilac twilight deepened to mauve; upon the surface of
the pool a primrose tint grew duller. Then the first bat zig-zagged
across the sky; and every clove-pink border became misty with the
wings of dusk-moths.

On Athalie's frail white gown one alighted,--a little grey thing
wearing a pair of peacock-tinted diamonds on its forewings; and as it
sat there, quivering, the iridescent incrustations changed from
burnished gold to green.

"Wonders, wonders, under the moon," murmured the girl--"thronging
miracles that fill the day and night, always, everywhere. And so few
to see them.... Sometimes, to me the blindness of the world to all the
loveliness that I 'see clearly' is like my own blindness to the hidden
wonders of the night--where uncounted myriads of little rainbow
spirits fly. And nobody sees and knows the living splendour of them
except when some grey-winged phantom strays indoors from the outer
shadows. And it astonishes us to see, under the drab forewings, a
blaze of scarlet, gold, or orange."

"I suppose," he said, "that the unseen night world all around us is no
more wonderful than what, in the day-world, the vast majority of us
never see, never suspect."

"I think it must be so, Clive. Being accustomed to a more densely
populated world than are many people, I believe that if I could see
only what they see,--merely that small portion of activity and life
which the world calls 'living things,' I should find the sunlit world
rather empty, and the night but a silent desolation under the stars."

After a few minutes' thought he asked in a low voice whether at that
moment there was anybody in the garden except themselves.

"Some people were here a little while ago, looking at the flowers. I
think they must have lived here many, many years ago; perhaps when
this old house was new."

"Could you not ask them who they were?"

"No, dear."

"Why?"

"If they were what you would call 'alive' I could not intrude upon
them, could I? The laws of reticence, the respect for privacy, remain
the same. I am conscious of no more impertinent curiosity concerning
them than I am concerning any passer in the city streets."

"Have they gone?"

"Yes. But all the evening I have been hearing children at play just
beyond the garden wall.... And, when I was a child, somebody killed a
little dog down by the causeway. He is here