More strange, new, delicious feelings crept into the boy’s heart as Lucie said these words. Paul and Lucie! He knew very well that when grown people called each other by their names they were very intimate, and how sweet it would be to know Lucie well enough for that; and besides, if they never called each other by their names except when they were alone, they would escape being teased. So Paul said, calling her for the first time by her name:
“Lucie, you won’t forget this, will you?”
“No, Paul,” said Lucie, suddenly dropping her gay and saucy air, and speaking quite sweetly and demurely.
And then, having turned a leaf in the book of life, they parted. Lucie heard Harper’s voice calling her, and Paul hurried away, his heart full of a singular rapture. How enticing the future looked to him! How he longed to be a man and an officer! And he meant to be a good officer, too, so that people would praise him to Lucie. He hurried through the park and past the edge of the town into the fields beyond, and on to the stone bridge, and, climbing up into the place where he and Toni had so often huddled together, sat there, lost in a delicious dream. It was an August afternoon, and the summer air was still and perfumed. In the purple woods on the other side of the water the birds were chirping sweetly, and under the bridge the little fishes were tumbling about in the dark water.
All these sights and sounds entered into the boy’s soul. The bell had been rung for the curtain to go up for this boy on the great tragi-comedy of human life. He sat there until the shadows grew long and the west was flaming, when, looking at the silver watch in his pocket, he realized that it was almost supper-time, and that he would have to run home to keep his mother from being uneasy. So he started at once.
As he scampered along the street in which Toni lived he saw, standing under an acacia tree close by Mademoiselle Duval’s shop, Toni and Denise Duval. Denise, as clean, as modest, as pretty as ever, was generously dividing a bun with Toni, and Toni—oh wonder!—was giving Denise two whole sticks of candy, only biting off one small piece for himself. Paul stopped, astounded at the spectacle. Usually it was Toni who gobbled up everything which Denise gave him, and now, oh, miracle, Toni was voluntarily giving up something to Denise. It was in truth an epoch-making day in Toni’s life!
During the rest of Lucie’s visit, she and Paul several times spoke together, and every time it was Paul who said to her:
“Lucie, don’t forget that when we grow up we are to call each other Paul and Lucie,”—and every time Lucie responded:
“Don’t you forget, Paul.”
Paul, who secretly mourned over Lucie’s depravity, talked to her quite seriously about refusing to learn geography and spelling and arithmetic and other rudiments of a young lady’s education. Lucie listened and, for the first time in her life, felt herself impelled by a will stronger than her own. None of the governesses and masters who had ever taught her had been able to impress her with the necessity of learning, nor, indeed, did Paul, for that matter, because Lucie by no means considered that geography and spelling and arithmetic were essential to a polite education. But Paul had an influence over her, nay, a sort of authority.