er by yourself.

"Out there, through that park, leads to the Bois de Boulogne--there's
a gap in the hedge you can get through; but mind and make everything
plain in front of you--_true_, before you go a step farther, or else
you'll have to wake and begin it all over again. You have only to will
it, and think yourself as awake, and it will come--on condition, of
course, that you have been there before. And mind, also, you must take
care how you touch things or people--you may hear, see, and smell; but
you mustn't touch, nor pick flowers or leaves, nor move things about.
It blurs the dream, like breathing on a window-pane. I don't know why,
but it does. You must remember that everything here is dead and gone
by. With you and me it is different; we're alive and real--that is,
_I_ am; and there would seem to be no mistake about your being real
too, Mr. Ibbetson, by the grasp of your hands. But you're _not_; and
why you are here, and what business you have in this my particular
dream, I cannot understand; no living person has ever come into it
before. I can't make it out. I suppose it's because I saw your reality
this afternoon, looking out of the window at the Tete Noire, and you
are just a stray figment of my over-tired brain--a very agreeable
figment, I admit; but you don't exist here just now--you can't
possibly; you are somewhere else, Mr. Ibbetson; dancing at Mabille,
perhaps, or fast asleep somewhere, and dreaming of French churches and
palaces, and public fountains, like a good young British
architect--otherwise I shouldn't talk to you like this, you may be
sure!

"Never mind. I am very glad to dream that I have been of use to you,
and you are very welcome here, if it amuses you to come--especially as
you are only a false dream of mine, for what else _can_ you be? And
now I must leave you: so good-by."

She disengaged her hands and laughed her angelic laugh, and then
turned towards the park. I watched her tall straight figure and
blowing skirts, and saw her follow some ladies and children into a
thicket that I remembered well, and she was soon out of sight.

I felt as if all warmth had gone out of my life; as if a joy had taken
flight; as if a precious something had withdrawn itself from my
possession, and the gap in my periphery had closed again.

Long I stood in thought, with my eyes fixed on the spot where she had
disappeared; and I felt inclined to follow, but then considered this
would not have been discre