"I don't sleep like a trunk. Trunks don't sleep!" "Grandpa says so. I listen at the open door, and have heard that we were going to Uriage not to Saint Martin. And Grandmother said that papa was dead to us." "What's that 'dead'?" "It is when you are buried." "I don't want papa to be buried." The little girl glanced at him with superiority and began to explain in trying to recall some new expression that she had overheard. "Well, not exactly. That's what is so funny; he is not dead at all, and he is dead to us." "Shall we see him again?" "Of course. But you must not say so." She inherited from her father, with his curiosity and high spirit, a definite confidence in the future. The child was not wrong about her mother's summer plans. The Derize family generally left Paris from July until November, spending the summer and part of the autumn at Saint Martin, a village built on the side of the mountain of Chamrousse among the lime and chestnut trees, above the castle of Saint-Ferriol. They lived in the old family mansion which Albert had inherited. It was a large châlet with its beams set in stone; with verandahs all round it, and green shutters to its windows. An avenue of plane-trees led from the house to the church. Mme. Derize, senior, had a room there, so vacation time was the best of the year for her. Out of doors all day long, the children acquired complexions like the country folk; and their cheeks grew rosy like winter apples. Albert worked undisturbed on his "History of the Peasant" and listened to the soothing voices of Nature which sang themselves into his book. But sometimes when nightfall began to come earlier, Elizabeth found that this simple life was growing monotonous; from the heart of the valley came echoes of festivity, the animation of a happy little village; above all she feared the solitude which forces one to seek distraction and happiness within. The Molay-Norrois rented a villa at Uriage, where they met a gathering of their acquaintances. When the heat made Grenoble unbearable, they easily persuaded their daughter to follow them. "Why should you shut yourself up in that great lonely barn? What if your husband should take it into his head to return? Come with us--you will be much more at ease." She had listened to them. In her husband's absence she was beginning to experience again emotions long since forgotten--fear and uneasiness. And the mere thought of the house at St. Martin with its long corridors, its suites of rooms and the monotonous silence of the country, depressed her.