"I've foreseen that objection. The Yard will be closed on rainy days. I want bright daylight, sunshine, the action of the light and other conditions besides, which will still further decrease the number of demonstrations. But that doesn't matter: each seat will cost two thousand francs, five thousand francs, if necessary! I tell you, there's no limit! No one will be content to die without having been to Noël Dorgeroux's Yard! Why, Victorien, you know it as well as I do! When all is said, the reality is more extraordinary than anything that you can imagine, even after what you have seen with your own eyes." I could not help asking him: "Then there are fresh manifestations?" He replied by nodding his head: "It's not so much that they're new," he said, "as that, above all, they have enabled me, with the factors which I already possess, to probe the truth to the bottom." "Uncle! Uncle!" I cried. "You mean to say that you know the truth?" "I know the whole truth, my boy," he declared. "I know how much is my work and how much has nothing to do with me. What was once darkness is now dazzling light." And he added, in a very serious tone: "It is beyond all imagination, my boy. It is beyond the most extravagant dreams; and yet it remains within the province of facts and certainties. Once humanity knows of it, the earth will pass through a thrill of religious awe; and the people who come here as pilgrims will fall upon their knees--as I did--fall upon their knees like children who pray and fold their hands and weep!" His words, which were obviously exaggerated, seemed to come from an ill-balanced mind. Yet I felt the force of their exciting and feverish influence: "Explain yourself, uncle, I beg you." "Later on, my boy, when all the points have been cleared up." "What are you afraid of?" "Nothing from you." "From whom then?" "Nobody. But I have my misgivings . . . quite wrongly, perhaps. Still, certain facts lead me to think that I am being spied upon and that some one is trying to discover my secret. It's just a few clues . . . things that have been moved from their place . . . and, above all, a vague intuition." "This is all very indefinite, uncle." "Very, I admit," he said, drawing himself up. "And so forgive me if my precautions are excessive . . . and let's talk of something else: of yourself, Victorien, of your plans . . ." "I have no plans, uncle." "Yes, you have. There's one at least that you're keeping from me." "How so?" He stopped in his walk and said: "You're in love with Bérangère." I did not think of protesting, knowing that Noël Dorgeroux had been in the Yard the day before, in front of the screen: "I am, uncle, I'm in love with Bérangère, but she doesn't care for me." "Yes, she does, Victorien." I displayed some slight impatience: