behind him. He had no
doubt of the singer. He knew well who it was, for the girl's speaking
voice had thrilled him long before this. He came to the eastern margin
of the grove of chestnuts and found that he was beside the open rond
point, where the pool lay within its stone circumference, unclean and
choked with lily-pads, and the fountain--a naked lady holding aloft a
shell--stood above. The rond point was not in reality round; it was an
oval with its greater axis at right angles to the long, straight avenue
of larches. At the two ends of the oval there were stone benches with
backs, and behind these, tall shrubs grew close and overhung, so that
even at noonday the spots were shaded.

* * * * *

XX

THE STONE BENCH AT THE ROND POINT

Mlle. Coira O'Hara sat alone upon the stone bench at the hither end of
the rond point. With a leisurely hand she put fine stitches into a
mysterious garment of white, with lace on it, and over her not too
arduous toil she sang, a demi voix, a little German song all about the
tender passions.

Ste. Marie halted his dragging steps a little way off, but the girl
heard him and turned to look. After that she rose hurriedly and stood as
if poised for flight, but Ste. Marie took his hat in his hands and came
forward.

"If you go away, Mademoiselle," said he, "if you let me drive you from
your place, I shall limp across to that pool and fall in and drown
myself, or I shall try to climb the wall yonder and Michel will have to
shoot me."

He came forward another step.

"If it is impossible," he said, "that you and I should stay here
together for a few little moments and talk about what a beautiful day it
is--if that is impossible, why then I must apologize for intruding upon
you and go on my way, inexorably pursued by the would-be murderer who
now stands six paces to the rear. Is it impossible, Mademoiselle?" said
Ste. Marie.

The girl's face was flushed with that deep and splendid understain. She
looked down upon the white garment in her hand and away across the broad
rond point, and in the end she looked up very gravely into the face of
the man who stood leaning upon his stick before her.

"I don't know," she said, in her deep voice, "what my father would wish.
I did not know that you were coming into the garden this morning, or--"

"Or else," said Ste. Marie, with a little touch of bitterness in his
tone--"or else you would not have been here