‘Where are we?’ asked Serge.

Albine did not know.  She had never before come to this part of the park.  They were now in a grove of cytisus and acacias, from whose clustering blossoms fell a soft, almost sugary perfume.  ‘We are quite lost,’ she laughed.  ‘I don’t know these trees at all.’

‘But the garden must come to an end somewhere,’ said Serge.  ’When we get to the end, you will know where you are, won’t you?’

‘No,’ she answered, waving her hands afar.

They fell into silence; never yet had the vastness of the park filled them with such pleasure.  They joyed at knowing that they were alone in so far-spreading a domain that even they themselves could not reach its limits.

‘Well, we are lost,’ said Serge, gaily; then humbly drawing near her he inquired:  ‘You are not afraid, are you?’

’Oh! no.  There’s no one except you and me in the garden.  What could I be afraid of?  The walls are very high.  We can’t see them, but they guard us, you know.’

Serge was now quite close to her, and he murmured, ’But a little time ago you were afraid of me.’

She looked him straight in the face, perfectly calm, without the least faltering in her glance.  ‘You hurt me,’ she replied, ’but you are different now.  Why should I be afraid of you?’

’Then you will let me hold you like this.  We will go back under the trees.’

’Yes, you may put your arm around me, it makes me feel happy.  And we’ll walk slowly, eh? so that we may not find our way again too soon.’

He had passed his arm round her waist, and it was thus that they sauntered back to the shade of the great forest trees, under whose arching vaults they slowly went, with love awakening within them.  Albine said that she felt a little tired, and rested her head on Serge’s shoulder.  The fabulous tree was now forgotten.  They only sought to draw their faces nearer together that they might smile in one another’s eyes.  And it was the trees, the maples, the elms, the oaks, with their soft green shade, that whisperingly suggested to them the first words of love.

‘I love you!’ said Serge, while his breath stirred the golden hair that clustered round Albine’s temples.  He tried to think of other words, but he could only repeat, ‘I love you!  I love you!’

Albine listened with a delightful smile upon her face.  The music of her heart was in accord with his.

‘I love you!  I love you!’ she sighed, with all the sweetness of her soft young voice.

Then, lifting up her blue eyes, in which the light of love was dawning, she asked, ‘How do you love me?’

Serge reflected for a moment.  The forest was wrapped in solemn quietude, the lofty naves quivered only with the soft footsteps of the young pair.

‘I love you beyond everything,’ he answered.  ’You are more beautiful than all else that I see when I open my window in the morning.  When I look at you, I want nothing more.  If I could have you only, I should be perfectly happy.’