صفحة 287 من 896

He moved from end to end of his voluptuous bedroom, looking again

at the scraps of the day's journey that came unbidden into his

mind; the slow toil up the hill at sunset, the setting sun, the

descent, the mill, the prison on the crag, the little village in

the hollow, the peasants at the fountain, and the mender of roads

with his blue cap pointing out the chain under the carriage. That

fountain suggested the Paris fountain, the little bundle lying on

the step, the women bending over it, and the tall man with his

arms up, crying, "Dead!"

"I am cool now," said Monsieur the Marquis, "and may go to bed."

So, leaving only one light burning on the large hearth, he let

his thin gauze curtains fall around him, and heard the night

break its silence with a long sigh as he composed himself to

sleep.