Page:The Strange Case of Miss Annie Spragg (1928).djvu/311

 woods on its crest. But in her black and red motor the Princess drove so fast that it was impossible to appreciate the beauties of the burgeoning countryside. They entered the villa by the main door and went from room to room, from the great salon with the anatomical paintings to the tiny room in the top fitted as a cell, with a hard iron bed, a crucifix and a wooden bench, where Anna d'Orobelli planned to retire for days at a time in prayer. They had very few words to say to each other. Father d'Astier from time to time murmured banal compliments upon her taste and the Princess showed the rooms with indifference as if it were a duty, as if she were saying all the while, "It is because of you that I have come to this. It is because of you that I must end my life in barren loneliness here in this solitary villa." When he asked her why she had troubled to put in so many bathrooms, she replied that she thought God would not mind if sometimes she had friends come to stop with her, and Father d'Astier murmured that he supposed God would not mind, though that was scarcely the Church's idea of a religious retirement.

When they had finished the house, they went down into the garden. The colonnades of plane trees were no longer yellow and brown as they had been nine months earlier when they last walked together in the garden. The whole place was covered by a canopy of fresh green leaves that in the spring sunlight appeared luminous, giving off a pure green light. The roses that climbed over the ancient stone balustrade above the valley were covered with white and yellow blossoms. 