draped with purple, erected before a portico painted on the back
cloth. The costumes of the Roman soldiers, he insisted, must
be copied from those on Trajan's Column.

His words opened superb vistas before the old priest's eyes;
he was enchanted, ravished, yet full of doubts and fears. Alas!
Monsieur Schuver was quite helpless if it came to designing anything
more ambitious than his paper roses. Then Jean must needs take
a look round in the shed where the properties were stored, and
the two discussed together how the stage must be set and the
side-scenes worked. Jean took measurements, drew up a plan, worked
out an estimate. He manifested a passionate eagerness that was
surprising, albeit the old priest took it all as a matter of
course. A batten would come here, a practicable door there. The
actor would enter there...

But the worthy priest checked him:

"Say the reciter, my dear boy; _actor_ is not a word for
self-respecting people."

Barring this trifling misunderstanding, they were in perfect
accord. The sun was setting by this time and the Abbé Bordier's
shadow, grotesquely elongated, danced up and down the sandy floor
of the shed, while the old, broken voice declaimed tags of verse
that echoed to the furthest recesses of the court. But Jean Servien
was smiling at the vision only _his_ eyes could see of Gabrielle,
the inspirer of all his enthusiasm.