IIo STORIES FROM DAUDET

‘ All hail, lady.’

And off she went, taking with her
the empty baskets.

When she vanished down the steep
path, it seemed to me that the pebbles
spurned by the hoofs of her mule fell
one by one on my heart. I heard
them for a long, long while, and until
close of day I stood there, half dazed,
not daring to move lest I should awaken
from my dream. Towards evening,
when the depths of the valleys began to
grow blue and the sheep drew together
bleating, one against the other, wanting
to enter the fold, I heard some one
calling me from below, and I saw our
young lady appear again, not smiling
as before, but trembling with cold and
wet and fright. It seems that at the
foot of the hill she had found the
Sorgue swollen by the rain, and that
she had been nearly drowned trying to
ford the stream. The trouble was that
at this time of the evening it was use-
less to think of returning to the farm,