"Why do you ask?" replied I to the question that I myself had put to Joubert years ago.
"I don't know," said Eloise, "but it looks as if it had."
Ah, the evil moat! The water lilies blossomed there in summer; all the length of a summer's day the darting dragon-flies cast their blue-gauze reflections upon the water; Amy Féraud and Francine Volnay might cast their laughter and cigarette-ends for ever on its surface, leaning over the bridge-rail and seeing nothing. It was left for the heart of a child to question its secret and divine its treason.
The path from the Pavilion cut through the trees and opened on the carriage-drive to the château. When we reached the drive, Eloise, terrified by the dark and the unaccustomed trees, was afraid to return alone. So I had to go back with her to the drawbridge.
"To-morrow!" said she.
"To-morrow!" replied I.
She gave me a moist kiss—just as children give; then, as if that was not enough, she flung her arms around my neck, squeezed me, and then ran across the drawbridge, laughing.
"Good-night!" I cried; and "Good-night!" followed me through the trees as I ran, for, even running most of the way, I had scarcely time to catch the last train at Evry.
It was late when I reached Paris; and as I drove through the blazing streets I felt as though I had taken a deep breath of some intoxicating air. The vision of Eloise in her new home pursued me. I felt as though I had taken a child from the jaws of a dragon. I had done a good act, and God repaid me, for Eloise had brought me a gift far better than pearls. She had brought me all that old freshness of long ago; she had brought me fresh in her hands the flowers of childhood; she had given me back the warmth of heart, the clearness of sight, the joy in little things, the joy without cause, which the war of sex and the world robs from a man.