The little chapel of the cross, Byzantine in style, consists of a dome and peristyle resting on four columns, their bases raised a few steps above the ground. An archbishop of Chambéry was buried there in 1889. His tomb is cut in the rock, and the interior of the monument is quite empty.
From the first station at the foot of the path Maurice could distinguish a figure seated on the steps between the columns. It was she, waiting for him. In vain, beside her, the pale gold branches of the acacias lightly showed their delicate sprays; in vain the purple mountains rose before him in their autumn light: he saw only her, framed at the foot of the cross. Her elbows on her knees, she rested her face upon her two hands, the fingers open and showing rosy and transparent in the sunlight. Motionlessly with her eyes of fire she watched him coming. He hastened to her all out of breath. When he was near her she rose with a single, unsuspected movement, like a careless fawn that surprises you with its unexpected play of muscles.
“I was afraid you weren’t coming,” she said, “and my life was over.”
“I was detained, Edith.”
He was so obviously upset that she could not reproach him. She took him by the hand and led him round to the other side of the chapel, where she showed him the lush grass, and a protecting shadow.
“Let’s sit down, shall we? It’s not cold. We shall be all right.”
They ensconced themselves side by side there, leaning against the wall of the shrine, which shut them out from Chambéry and the world. They could see nothing in front of them but the peaks of Nivolet in the full sunlight. She twined herself caressingly round him.
“I love you so much,” she murmured plaintively.
Was not their love delicious and dolorous both at once? They called each other by endearing terms, and yet they were not lovers. She held herself away a little to get a better look at him.
“You have been unhappy. Was it on my account?”