In the courtyard under the fig-tree where his grandfather, who had
long since died, had been accustomed to rest, there were broken plates
and a poor sick chicken.

In the garden of roses and gleaming pear-trees where his fiancée had
stood, there was an old woman.

The story does not tell who she was.




THE HIGHWAY OF LIFE


One day a poet sat down at a table to write a story. Not a single
idea would come to him, but nevertheless he was happy, because the sun
shone on a geranium on the window-sill, and because a gnat flew about
in the blue of the open window.

Suddenly his life appeared before him like a great white road. It
began in a dark grove where there were laughing waters, and ended at a
quiet grave overgrown with brambles, nettles, and soapwort.

In the dark grove he found the guardian-angel of his childhood. He had
the golden wings of a wasp, fair hair, and a face as calm as the water
of a well on a summer's day.

The guardian-angel said to the poet: