"Barabant, I do not play with you," Nicole answered earnestly. "Then why have you avoided me?" He waited for her answer, but she said firmly: "I cannot tell you." "Assuredly she is beginning to love me," thought Barabant, and, well content, did not press the question. They strayed a little from the Conciergerie, and leaning over the bank, contemplated the river scenes below, following the fortunes of the languid fishermen, the antics of a kitten that romped over the flat decks herded together, and the glistening backs of boys splashing near the shore. "Of whom were you thinking so seriously before I came?" Barabant asked, secure in his new confidence. He sought her face, hoping to surprise some trace of confusion. "I was wondering how it would seem to have a mother," Nicole answered. She crumbled a flower and scattered the petals on the wafting stir of the air before she turned. "But then we might not agree. Perhaps I am lucky. What do you think?" "Such reverie for a mother?" "Oh, there are moments when one has such moods." "I had hoped you were thinking of me." "Really?" She lifted her eyebrows slightly. "And why?" Her composure routed his agreeable theories and plunged him into perplexities. So, abandoning his confident attitude, he exclaimed vehemently: "Nicole, what has happened? What is there--a misunderstanding, or what? Surely you will not tell me that it is natural for you to shun me so persistently. I will be answered!" "I don't; I don't. I will not have you saying that!" She seized the opportunity of a passing party of muscadins--the dandies of the day--to offer her cockades. On her return, Barabant said more quietly: "Listen to me, Nicole. You misunderstand me; I do not upbraid you. I want to thank you. I owe you much, and you give me no opportunity to tell you of my gratitude. That is what vexes me. Voyons, Nicole, we had begun so well!" He leaned closer and said mischievously: "Oh, if I had known you would leave, I would have remained unconscious all the day. I've cursed myself ever since." He laughed, and growing bolder as he perceived she listened without displeasure, he poured into her ear, in one breath daring, in another shy, a thousand and one of those vague, delightful half-confidences which in the imagination of the lover awaken as naturally as the flowers open to the sun. Nicole could not but listen. She assembled a bouquet and pressed her face against it to screen her pleasure from his avid scrutiny. From time to time she turned, and looking him full in the face, sought to read there the true value of his words. But almost immediately she would turn with a wistful smile of unbelief. At length she checked him, saying, with reluctant gentleness: "Enough, Barabant. Your imagination runs away with you. You do not know your own feelings." Barabant, borne on by the ardor of his emotions, retorted point-blank: "And you, do you know yours?"