She gave a quivering little laugh. He looked at her with intense earnestness, and the blood flushed into his face. “You will have my life’s entire homage, Clémence,” he responded gravely. “To have you for my wife is beyond my desert. I want you to do nothing for me but be yourself and smile on my endeavours to please you.” He took his hands lightly from her shoulders, and she clung weakly and gently to his arm. “You do believe I would do anything in the world for you?” she said in a kind of broken passion. “Oh, I feel so foolish, so ignorant--and you have a great career before you. But if I ever have a chance----” “What makes you speak like this?” he asked in a tone of reverent wonder. “I have done nothing for you----” “Oh, oh!” she murmured, as if she concealed a secret pain. “You do not understand me. But if you are ever in any misfortune----” “You are the sweetest child in the world,” Luc interrupted, “and you must not think of misfortune--I trust never to bring you within the shadow of any trouble.” She gave a little fluttering sigh and slipped her arm from his. They reached a low fence that separated the meadow from the beech trees and there they rested, looking, through a break in the ruddy foliage, at the sweet expanse of open country. Luc’s heart was singing within him. All sense of struggle, of discord, of loneliness, of hopes deferred, of ambitions cheated was over; the road was open, free. He would tread it in the old ways of honour and nobility; he would fulfil himself, and at the same time respect his name, his blazon, and the traditions of his race. His companion was beside him and prepared to follow him with more than conventional affection, while he experienced a new and exquisite pleasure in offering her all the devotion of a hitherto untouched heart. In truth it seemed to Luc, as he gazed over the prospect of Provence, that here, in his native place, among his own people, he had found the peace he had looked for uselessly abroad; here, in simple Clémence, were the high virtues he had once thrilled to think he had met in Carola Koklinska. The sun glowed to its setting; superb bars of purple and scarlet began to burn out of the dense gold of the west; a low, clear breeze arose and swept over the grass. Clémence broke the charmed silence. “Are you sure of me?” she asked with panting force. He gave her a quick smile; the glamour of all his visions and hopes transfigured the moment. “As I am sure of God,” he said. He raised the cold, mittened hand from the fence and kissed it. “Ah, Luc,” she said below her breath, “Luc!” They went slowly back towards the fête with the sun behind them and their shadows long across the grass before them, and all the air circled with glory and the ineffable light of the setting sun. As they entered the grounds of the fair they met the old Marquis and Joseph.