ldren's sake, and for the sake of what he seemed to divine secretly
at work in them:

"This Pool is a place apart, I think. The Saint has given his
benediction to it."

He was speaking at random to keep Hermione there. And yet his words
seemed chosen by some one for him to say.

"Surely good must come to the island over that waterway."

"You think so?"

Her stress upon the pronoun made him reply:

"Hermione, you do not think me the typical Frenchman of this century,
who furiously denies over a glass of absinthe the existence of the
Creator of the world?"

"No. But I scarcely thought you believed in the efficacy of a plaster
Saint."

"Not of the plaster--no. But don't you think it possible that truth,
emanating from certain regions and affecting the souls of men, might
move them unconsciously to embody it in symbol? What if this Pool were
blessed, and men, feeling that it was blessed, put San Francesco here
with his visible benediction?"

He said to himself that he was playing with his imagination, as
sometimes he played with words, half-sensuously and half-aesthetically;
yet he felt to-night as if within him there was something that might
believe far more than he had ever suspected it would be possible for him
to believe.

And that, too, seemed to have come to him from the hidden children who
were so near.

"I don't feel at all as if the Pool were blessed," said Hermione. She
sighed.

"Let us go to the cliff," she said, again, this time with a strong
impatience.

He could not, of course, resist her desire, so they moved away, and
mounted to the summit of the island.

The children were there. They could just see them in the darkness, Vere
seated upon the wooden bench, Ruffo standing beside her. Their forms
looked like shadows, but from the shadows voices came.

When he saw them, Artois stood still. Hermione was going on. He put his
hand upon her arm to stop her. She sent an almost sharp inquiry to him
with her eyes.

"Don't you think," he said--"don't you think it is a pity to disturb
them?"

"Why?"

"They seem so happy together."

He glanced at her for sympathy, but she gave him none.

"Am I to have nothing?" she thought. And a passion of secret anger woke
up in her. "Am I to have nothing at all? May I not even speak to this
boy, in whom I have seen Maurice for a moment--because if I do I may
disturb some childish gossip?"

Her eyes gave to Artois a fierce rebuke.

"I beg your pardon, He