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70 one lives. They are the only ones that harmonize with the sky and the crops, with the colour of the rivers and roads and roofs."

"Quite right," said M. Des Boys.

"Xavier, I love you," Rose whispered, taking M. Hervart's arm.

The inspection of the garden was continued, and it was decided that M. Encoignard's collaboration should be reduced to the ordinary functions of a plain docile gardener. One or two new plants were admitted on condition that the old should be respected.

M. Hervart had got up early and had been strolling about the garden for some time past. He had spent half the night in thought. All the women he had loved or known had visited his memory with their customary gestures and the attitudes they affected. There was that other one who seemed always to have come merely to pay a friendly call; it needed real diplomacy to obtain from her what, at the bottom of her heart, she really desired. Between these two extremes there were many gradations. Most of them liked to give themselves little by little, playing their desire against their sense of shame. M. Hervart ﬂattered himself