François groaned. “When I think of the reams of execrable poems I’m doomed to read before that!” he exclaimed as they strolled under the yellowing trees. “Look here! We must really go. I’ve got all my canvases to pack, and so has René.”
“But it’s only au revoir,” declared Thouret. “Sweet Anne Page is coming to Paris. C’est déjà une chose tout-à-fait entendue. Nous la menerons entendre Sara, et Mounet-Sully dans Hernani.”
“We shall have her with us before the winter sets in. And then we shall come back next year,” added Dacier.
“Good-bye,” returned Anne simply, shaking hands with each of them in turn.
She walked back into the house when they were gone, noticing minutely, trivial things such as a little stain on the paint in the hall; a flower that had fallen out of a jar on the window ledge.
An hour later—when it was nearly dark, René Dampierre found her in the rose garden.
She stood quite still when she saw him coming, and waited for him to speak.
“I came back,” he began, stammering a little. “The maid told me you were in the garden. I forgot this book. You lent it to me.”
He held it out to her as he spoke. It was a little volume of Herrick.
“Keep it,” Anne said. “It’s mine.”