The Red Lily, vol 3 | Page 7

as a coquette, and perhaps
worse. The date of her departure had been fixed for May 5th.
The day shone brilliant, pure, and charming on the Arno valley.
Therese, dreamy, saw from the terrace the immense morning rose
placed in the blue cup of Florence. She leaned forward to discover, at
the foot of the flowery hills, the imperceptible point where she had
known infinite joys. There the cemetery garden made a small, sombre
spot near which she divined the Via Alfieri. She saw herself again in
the room wherein, doubtless, she never would enter again. The hours
there passed had for her the sadness of a dream. She felt her eyes
becoming veiled, her knees weaken, and her soul shudder. It seemed to
her that life was no longer in her, and that she had left it in that corner
where she saw the black pines raise their immovable summits. She
reproached herself for feeling anxiety without reason, when, on the
contrary, she should be reassured and joyful. She knew she would meet
Jacques Dechartre in Paris. They would have liked to arrive there at the

same time, or, rather, to go there together. They had thought it
indispensable that he should remain three or four days longer in
Florence, but their meeting would not be retarded beyond that. They
had appointed a rendezvous, and she rejoiced in the thought of it. She
wore her love mingled with her being and running in her blood. Still, a
part of herself remained in the pavilion decorated with goats and
nymphs a part of herself which never would return to her. In the full
ardor of life, she was dying for things infinitely delicate and precious.
She recalled that Dechartre had said to her: "Love likes charms. I
gathered from the terrace the leaves of a tree that you had admired."
Why had she not thought of taking a stone of the pavilion wherein she
had forgotten the world?
A shout from Pauline drew her from her thoughts. Choulette, jumping
from a bush, had suddenly kissed the maid, who was carrying overcoats
and bags into the carriage. Now he was running through the alleys,
joyful, his ears standing out like horns. He bowed to the Countess
Martin.
"I have, then, to say farewell to you, Madame."
He intended to remain in Italy. A lady was calling him, he said: it was
Rome. He wanted to see the cardinals. One of them, whom people
praised as an old man full of sense, would perhaps share the ideas of
the socialist and revolutionary church. Choulette had his aim: to plant
on the ruins of an unjust and cruel civilization the Cross of Calvary, not
dead and bare, but vivid, and with its flowery arms embracing the
world. He was founding with that design an order and a newspaper.
Madame Martin knew the order. The newspaper was to be sold for one
cent, and to be written in rhythmic phrases. It was a newspaper to be
sung. Verse, simple, violent, or joyful, was the only language that
suited the people. Prose pleased only people whose intelligence was
very subtle. He had seen anarchists in the taverns of the Rue Saint
Jacques. They spent their evenings reciting and listening to romances.
And he added:
"A newspaper which shall be at the same time a song-book will touch

the soul of the people. People say I have genius. I do not know whether
they are right. But it must be admitted that I have a practical mind."
Miss Bell came down the steps, putting on her gloves:
"Oh, darling, the city and the mountains and the sky wish you to lament
your departure. They make themselves beautiful to-day in order to
make you regret quitting them and desire to see them again."
But Choulette, whom the dryness of the Tuscan climate tired, regretted
green Umbria and its humid sky. He recalled Assisi. He said:
"There are woods and rocks, a fair sky and white clouds. I have walked
there in the footsteps of good Saint Francis, and I transcribed his
canticle to the sun in old French rhymes, simple and poor."
Madame Martin said she would like to hear it. Miss Bell was already
listening, and her face wore the fervent expression of an angel
sculptured by Mino.
Choulette told them it was a rustic and artless work. The verses were
not trying to be beautiful. They were simple, although uneven, for the
sake of lightness. Then, in a slow and monotonous voice, he recited the
canticle.
"Oh, Monsieur Choulette," said Miss Bell, "this canticle goes up to
heaven, like the hermit in the Campo Santo of Pisa, whom some one
saw going up the mountain that the goats liked. I will tell you. The old
hermit went