But Serge suddenly stopped short on seeing tears trickle down Albine’s cheeks and mingle with the smile that played around her lips.

‘What is the matter with you?’ he exclaimed; ’are you in pain?  Have you hurt yourself?’

’No, don’t you see I’m smiling?  I don’t know how it is, but the scent of all these trees forces tears into my eyes.’  She glanced at him, and then resumed:  ‘Why, you’re crying too!  You see you can’t help it.’

‘Yes,’ he murmured, ’all this deep shade affects one.  It seems so peaceful, so mournful here that one feels a little sad.  But you must tell me, you know, if anything makes you really unhappy.  I have not done anything to annoy you, have I? you are not vexed with me?’

She assured him that she was not.  She was quite happy, she said.

‘Then why are you not enjoying yourself more?  Shall we have a race?’

‘Oh! no, we can’t race,’ she said, disdainfully, with a pout.  And when he went on to suggest other amusements, such as bird-nesting or gathering strawberries or violets, she replied a little impatiently:  ’We are too big for that sort of thing.  It is childish to be always playing.  Doesn’t it please you better to walk on quietly by my side?’

She stepped along so prettily, that it was, indeed, a pleasure to hear the pit-pat of her little boots on the hard soil of the path.  Never before had he paid attention to the rhythmic motion of her figure, the sweep of her skirts that followed her with serpentine motion.  It was happiness never to be exhausted, to see her thus walking sedately by his side, for he was ever discovering some new charm in the lissom suppleness of her limbs.

‘You are right,’ he said, ’this is really the best.  I would walk by your side to the end of the world, if you wished it.’

A little further on, however, he asked her if she were not tired, and hinted that he would not be sorry to have a rest himself.

‘We might sit down for a few minutes,’ he suggested in a stammering voice.

‘No,’ she replied, ‘I don’t want to.’

’But we might lie down, you know, as we did in the meadows the other day.  We should be quite comfortable.’

‘No, no; I don’t want to.’

And she suddenly sprang aside, as if scared by the masculine arms outstretched towards her.  Serge called her a big stupid, and tried to catch her.  But at the light touch of his fingers she cried out with such an expression of pain that he drew back, trembling.

‘I have hurt you?’ he said.

She did not reply for a moment, surprised, herself, at her cry of fear, and already smiling at her own alarm.

‘No; leave me, don’t worry me;’ and she added in a grave tone, though she tried to feign jocularity:  ’you know that I have my tree to look for.’