Through the sand-covered paths between the flowerbeds they walked to the
boxwood hedge which bordered the park on the southern side. They passed
before the orange-grove, the monumental door of which was surmounted by
the Lorraine cross of Mareuilles, and then passed under the linden-trees
which formed an alley on the lawn. Statues of nymphs shivered in the
damp shade studded with pale lights. A pigeon, posed on the shoulder of
one of the white women, fled. From time to time a breath of wind
detached a dried leaf which fell, a shell of red gold, where remained a
drop of rain. Therese pointed to the nymph and said:

"She saw me when I was a girl and wishing to die. I suffered from dreams
and from fright. I was waiting for you. But you were so far away!"

The linden alley stopped near the large basin, in the centre of which was
a group of tritons blowing in their shells to form, when the waters
played, a liquid diadem with flowers of foam.

"It is the Joinville crown," she said.

She pointed to a pathway which, starting from the basin, lost itself in
the fields, in the direction of the rising sun.

"This is my pathway. How often I walked in it sadly! I was sad when I
did not know you."

They found the alley which, with other lindens and other nymphs, went
beyond. And they followed it to the grottoes. There was, in the rear of
the park, a semicircle of five large niches of rocks surmounted by
balustrades and separated by gigantic Terminus gods. One of these gods,
at a corner of the monument, dominated all the others by his monstrous