last he himself would send her into the garden, telling her
not to come back before an hour.

'In that way,' he said, 'I shall get sunlight, fresh air, and roses till
to-morrow.'

Often, when he saw her coming in out of breath, he would cross-examine
her. Which path had she taken? Had she wandered among the trees, or had
she gone round the meadow side? Had she seen any nests? Had she sat down
behind a bush of sweetbriar, or under an oak, or in the shade of a clump
of poplars? But when she answered him and tried to describe the garden
to him, he would put his hand to her lips.

'No, no,' he said gently. 'It is wrong of me. I don't want to know. I
would rather see it myself.'

Then he would relapse into his favourite dream of all the greenery which
he could feel only a step away. For several days he lived on that
dream alone. At first, he said, he had perceived the garden much more
distinctly. As he gained strength, the surging blood that warmed
his veins seemed to blur his dreamy imaginings. His uncertainties
multiplied. He could no longer tell whether the trees were on the right,
whether the water flowed at the bottom of the garden, or whether some
great rocks were not piled below his windows. He talked softly of all
this to himself. On the slightest indication he would rear wondrous
plans, which the song of a bird, the creaking of a bough, the scent of a
flower, would suddenly make him modify, impelling him to plant a thicket
of lilac in one spot, and in another to place flower-beds where formerly
there had been a lawn. Every hour he designed some new garden, much to
the amusement of Albine, who, whenever she surprised him at it, would
exclaim with a burst of laughter: 'That's not it, I assure you. You
can't have any idea of it. It's more beautiful than all the beautiful
things you ever saw. So don't go racking your head about it. The
garden's mine, and I will give it to you. Be easy, it won't run away.'

Serge, who had already been so afraid of the light, felt considerable
trepidation when he found himself strong enough to go and rest his
elbows on the window-sill. Every evening he once more repeated,
'To-morrow,' and 'To-morrow.' He would turn away in his bed with
a shudder when Albine came in, and would cry out that she smelt of
hawthorn, that she had scratched her hands in burrowing a hole through
a hedge to bring him all its odour. One morning, however, she suddenly
took him up in her arms, and almost carryin