are falling in the forest of Marly;" the brush nearly fell from his hand.
"Yes," he answered; "they are falling, and the leaves lie dead, as all things lie dead sooner or later." His voice had lost its harshness.
"The summer is over, but it is not winter yet, and all things are not dead. Ah! go on, I like to watch you. The little grey squirrel makes me think"
"Why did you keep it?" he asked, through his teeth.
"To remember—though it was not possible to forget," she answered. "Give it to me; let me put it round my throat."
"Madame will be seated again," he said, trying to fall back into his most formal manner.
"No, let me stand here, you have so nearly finished, and do not want me to sit again? Thank you, monsieur," and she put the collar round her throat. "I love it," she whispered. "No, don't stop," she went on, hurriedly, "and don't look at me, there is no necessity, you do not forget my face."
"No, I do not forget," he answered, with his eyes on the picture.
"Surely that chin is a little heavy above the collar. Nay, feel it—yes—yes, just this once." She rested her face on his sleeve for a moment, and softly pulled his right hand towards the palette, and then the left one towards her chin. "The touch of the fur, does it make you remember?" she asked, as she raised her head.
"I have never forgotten," he answered, with a little break in his voice; and the chin on the canvas grew round again, and the lines about it were smoothed away.
She spoke again, hardly above her breath—
"I so often think of the forest," she said, "and the path towards where the fountains had been: we played our little play"
"It was only a play," he half turned his head towards her; but softly she put up her hand, and pushed it from her.
"No," she said, "think of the girl who was, Henri," her voice was almost tragic in its sweetness; "and of how she and you pretended they were back in the days of the Queen. You were walking with me en polisson, and I was a Court lady in the habit de Marly."
"It was only a play," he repeated.
"It was much more to me," she answered. "You said once when the wind blew among my hair that it was like the marriage of the sunshine and the wind. Take away the smoothness there" (she nodded at the picture), "and put in a suggestion of the wind, so that I may remember."
"It is all too late," he said bitterly, as he took up some colour from his palette of a brighter hue than he had already used, and worked it into the hair. "It was like gold," he said to himself. She was almost bitter when she spoke again.
"I can see your face as if it were yesterday, but you have forgotten." The reproach seemed to sting him.
"Never." It was like a cry of pain. She gave a long sigh and went on—
"I think of your eyes sometimes, they looked down at me. Have you forgotten mine?"
"I never forgot, Madeline," he exclaimed, and turned towards her again; but again she put up her hand, and kept his face from her.
"No, no," she said; "go on, and don't look at me, or think of me, as I am now. Think of me as I was then, and stood beneath the chestnuts, and felt the colour come to my face; surely it was not like that you have put on my face there. You said—but I am afraid to think of your words " (and there was a quiver in her voice); "I have so often wondered if they were true.'
"They were all true," and he touched the cheeks of the portrait.
"You said that you loved me."
"I did tell you I loved you, Madeline."
"But you forgot soon—you have loved other women since, and said the same words to them!"
"I have said them to no other woman. I have been dumb, and lived remembering," and still, without knowing it, his brush wandered over the canvas, till the blue had come into the eyes again, and the gold to the hair, and the softness of youth to the skin, till the face of the made-up, middle-aged woman had gone, and in its stead remained the beautiful one of twenty years before. And a smile broke over the stern face as he watched lovingly the effect of every touch his brush made. "I loved you," he repeated simply, "and have lived alone for your sake." Then suddenly he put down the brush, and turned quickly. She bent her head so that he should not see her face, but he stooped till his lips for a minute touched the grey fur about her throat. There was a sound of wheels beneath; the carriage had come for her.
