‘And you’ve come just now?’

‘By the post-coach.’

‘And not too quickly!’

‘I wanted to see Sylvie; is she still here?’

‘She never leaves before morning; she adores dancing, you know.’

The next moment I saw her, and though her face looked tired, I noticed that same Attic smile as she turned her black eyes upon me. A youth standing near by withdrew with a bow; she would forgo the quadrille.

It was almost broad daylight as we went out hand-in-hand from the dance. The flowers drooped in the loosened coils of Sylvie’s hair, and petals from the bouquet at her waist fell down over the crumpled lace of her frock. I offered to take her home and we set out beneath a grey sky along the right bank of the Thève. Yellow and white water lilies bloomed in the still pools at each bend in the stream, upon a delicately embroidered background of water stars; the meadows were dotted with sheaves and hayricks, and though their fragrance was less intoxicating than the cool scent of the woods and the thickets of flowering thorn, we followed the river path.

‘Sylvie,’ I said, ‘you love me no longer!’

‘Ah, my dear friend,’ she sighed, ‘you must be reasonable; things don’t come out in life as we want them to. You once spoke to me of La Nouvelle Héloïse; I’ve read it now, but the first sentence that met my eyes made me shudder, ‘Every girl who reads this book is lost’. However, I went on with it, trusting to my own judgment. You remember the day we dressed up in the wedding clothes at my aunt’s. In the book there were engravings of lovers in old-fashioned costumes, and when I saw Saint-Preux I thought of you, and I was Julie. Oh, if you had only been here then! But they told me you were in Italy, and I suppose you saw girls there much prettier than I am.’

‘None as beautiful as you, Sylvie, nor with such clear-cut features. You might be a nymph out of some old legend! And our country here; it’s just as beautiful as the Italian country; the rocks there are just as high as ours, to be sure, and a cascade falls down over them like the one at Terni, but I saw nothing there that I miss here.’

‘And in Paris?’

‘In Paris?’ I shook my head without replying, and I thought suddenly of that shadowy form that had troubled my mind for so long.

‘Sylvie,’ I said, ‘let’s stop here, do you mind?’ Then I knelt at her feet, and told her of my indecision and my fickleness, while the hot tears rolled down my cheeks, and I called up the sinister apparition that haunted my life. ‘Sylvie,’ I sobbed, ‘you must save me, for I shall always love you and no one else.’

She turned to me tenderly and was about to speak, but at that moment we were interrupted by a gay burst of laughter from some bushes behind us. It was Sylvie’s brother, who, after numerous refreshments at the dance, had come on to join us, in a state of exaltation far beyond the usual limits of country gaiety. He called to Sylvie’s admirer, who had remained behind the bushes, but who now came towards us even more unsteadily than his companion. He seemed more embarrassed with me than with Sylvie, and his sincere though awkward deference prevented me from bearing him any ill-will for having been the partner with whom Sylvie had stayed so late at the dance. I thought him not a very dangerous rival.

‘We must go home, so good-bye for the present,’ Sylvie said, and she offered me her cheek, which did not seem to offend her admirer.