The flame which blazed in his bright eyes put an answering glow in her own. She was aware that her beauty had startled him. For the first time in her life she was awake to her own loveliness, a sense wonderful and sweet. A delicate, throbbing fire came fluttering up through her breast; a flush stole into her cheeks and warmed their ashy pallor. Her eyes met his: in his eyes were joy, surprise, and longing. His eyes met hers: and all her doubts went out in wordless joy. For, when she perceived that look in his face, she, too, was thrilled with longing; the silence sang; fire thrilled her heart; suddenly neck and cheeks flamed red. She answered his look with glorious eyes, humid, terrified, alight. Then her frightened eyes fell and her shy face. But, like a wave which breaks along a beach in a passionate surge, her heart rushed out to greet him. He saw her neck and her cheeks flame red; passion struck him to the heart. With a gesture of haughty but boyish humility he pushed through the hedge, seized the sheltering pomegranate branches, and swept them aside. She stood uncurtained before him. He gazed at her. “St. Jacques!” he cried. “Are you a living creature?” She regarded him for an instant with a look of undisguised terror, catching her breath with a sobbing sound right pitiful to hear; then her quivering, piteous face was made exquisite by tears. A back-wash of timidity held him silently staring at her,--a boy, hot and hasty, sure of himself, impulsively bold, but abashed,--admiration and longing ablaze in his eyes. Gabrielle stammered, but could not find words; her breast heaved and sank; she could not control it. Overwhelmed by the sudden strange rush of emotion, she swayed giddily, dizzily put out one hand to steady herself, and laid it upon his arm: a tremulous smile came over her face; her tears, like an April shower, were gone. His hand sought her other hand; found it; held it; thus their hands met. Half a step timidly they approached each other; then stood at a halt as if turned to stone. Her frightened breath was the only sound save the stirring of the night-wind in the dark boughs overhead. Shaking like a wind-blown leaf, “_Que désirez-vous de moi?_” she gasped. His voice, too, was trembling. “That you should love me a little, for pity’s sake, ... and quite forget to fear!” His voice seemed to Gabrielle godlike. “See, then ... I fear nothing.... I should as soon think of fearing the air we breathe!” she said, adoring her slender young demigod out of the hedge. Then suddenly she raised her hand and laid it caressingly on his cheek; her trembling fingers felt like flowers trailed across his face. He laughed. There was an infectious sweetness and merriment in his laughter. Then they laughed together, softly,--first love and joy are silent things. “You are the god of love,” she said, with infinite simplicity. “Else, how could you fly over the hedge?”