woodman there was painted visibly on the dusky sky that end for her which
he had foreseen, he was not indifferent to it; he resented it; he was
stirred to a vague desire to render it impossible.

If Jeannot had not gone by across the fields he would have left her and
let her alone from that night thenceforwards; as it was,--

"Good night, Bébée," he said to her. "Tomorrow I will finish the
Broodhuis and bring you your first book. Do not dream too much, or you
will prick your lace patterns all awry. Good night, pretty one."

Then he turned and went back through the green dim lanes to the city.

Bébée stood a moment looking after him, with a happy smile; then she
picked up the fallen pear-blossom, and ran home as fast as her feet would
take her.

That night she worked very late watering her flowers, and trimming them,
and then ironing out a little clean white cap for the morrow; and then
sitting down under the open lattice to prick out all old Annémie's
designs by the strong light of the full moon that flooded her hut with
its radiance.

But she sang all the time she worked, and the gay, pretty, wordless songs
floated across the water and across the fields, and woke some old people
in their beds as they lay with their windows open, and they turned and
crossed themselves, and said, "Dear heart!--this is the eve of the
Ascension, and the angels are so near we hear them."

But it was no angel; only the thing that is nearer heaven than anything