Bébée did not understand at all.

"I thought God made women," she said, a little awe-stricken.

"You call it God. People three thousand years ago called it Mercury or
Hermes. Both mean the same thing,--mere words to designate an unknown
quality. Where are you going? Does your home lie here?"

"Yes, onward, quite far onward," said Bébée, wondering that he had
forgotten all she had told him the day before about her hut, her garden,
and her neighbors. "You did not come and finish your picture to-day: why
was that? I had a rosebud for you, but it is dead now."

"I went to Anvers. You looked for me a little, then?"

"Oh, all day long. For I was so afraid I had been ungrateful."

"That is very pretty of you. Women are never grateful, my dear, except
when they are very ill-treated. Mercury, whom we were talking of, gave
them, among other gifts, a dog's heart."

Bébée felt bewildered; she did not reason about it, but the idle,
shallow, cynical tone pained her by its levity and its unlikeness to
the sweet, still, gray summer evening.

"Why are you in such a hurry?" he pursued. "The night is cool, and it is
only seven o'clock. I will walk part of the way with you."

"I am in a hurry because I have Annémie's patterns to do," said Bébée,
glad that he spoke of a thing that she knew how to answer. "You see,