The trees still retained their foliage, but the colours changed from day to day, a marvel to behold. The leaves of the lindens became a pale yellow, those of the oaks, at first a red copper, later that colour of rust which they keep all winter, for they do not fall: shrivelled, hardened, and curled up they cling to the branches until the new growth comes in the spring and flings them down. “They are like those feelings,” I said to Raymonde, “which remain in the heart even after they are dead, and which only a new passion has the power to drive away.” Whenever I gave vent to such sentimental rubbish as this, the art of which one acquires in society, she used to look me full in the face, her astonished eyes seeming to discover in me some unknown abysses. Why did I aim to dazzle her with such empty talk? I was thinking of those faded memories which still occasionally obtruded themselves upon my mind, and which, although they had not yet entirely gone, were destined, under the influence of my love, to disappear only to be reborn another day. “None of my affections is dead,” she replied. “None will die before I do.” We were passing the Green Fountain, and we paused to give our horses a drink from the basin. We saw the reflection of their heads mingle in the calm water, and leaning forward, she unconsciously and I intentionally, we saw our own heads come together and touch. Drawing back I looked at Raymonde: she was blushing as if she had felt my lips, although they had never yet touched her. Two years before, more than two years since, it was, on the birthday of spring, I had waylaid her there. I recalled the incident to her, and asked her the reason of her fear. “I did not expect you,” she said. “Was I so dreadful?” I inquired. “We must believe so, since I was afraid,” she answered, with her clear laugh. I should have been glad to have her assure me that even at that time she had begun to love me, although nothing could have equalled the charm that her ignorance of her own heart then possessed. “Whom did you love before me?” I asked. “Before you? My mother, and my father and all this besides,” she answered, and stretched out her arms in a comprehensive gesture that her little riding whip accentuated. “All this?” I repeated, not grasping her meaning. “Yes, the trees, the little pond that is down there, the orchards, the meadows, and the whole sky that you see.” I laughed as I listened to this catalogue. “I am not jealous of them,” I said. She looked about her at the forest, the luminous autumn forest which had contributed to the awakening of her spirit, and murmured: “You may well be, nevertheless.”