‘Oh, the dear baby!’ exclaimed Albine, as she looked at Serge, who had fallen asleep upon her neck at the same time as the heavens.
She laid him down in bed and shut the windows. Next morning, however, they were opened at break of day. Serge could no longer live without the sunlight. His strength was growing, he was becoming accustomed to the gusts of air which sent the alcove curtains flying. Even the azure, the everlasting azure, began to pall upon him. He grew weary of being white and swanlike, of ever swimming on heaven’s limpid lake. He came to wish for a pack of black clouds, some crumbling of the skies, that would break upon the monotony of all that purity. And as his health returned, he hungered for keener sensations. He now spent hours in gazing at the verdant bough: he would have liked to see it grow, expand, and throw out its branches to his very bed. It no longer satisfied him, but only roused desires, speaking to him as it did of all the trees whose deep-sounding call he could hear although their crests were hidden from his sight. An endless whispering of leaves, a chattering as of running water, a fluttering as of wings, all blended in one mighty, long-drawn, quivering voice, resounded in his ears.
‘When you are able to get up,’ said Albine, ‘you shall sit at the window. You will see the lovely garden!’
‘Oh! I can see it, I hear it; I know where the trees are, where the water runs, where the violets grow.’
And then he added: ‘But I can’t see it clearly, I see it without any light. I must be very strong before I shall be able to get as far as the window.’
At times when Albine thought him asleep, she would vanish for hours. And on coming in again, she would find him burning with impatience, his eyes gleaming with curiosity.
‘Where have you been?’ he would call to her, taking hold of her arms, and feeling her skirts, her bodice, and her cheeks. ‘You smell of all sorts of nice things. Ah! you have been walking on the grass?’
At this she would laugh and show him her shoes wet with dew.
‘You have been in the garden! you have been in the garden!’ he then exclaimed delightedly. ‘I knew it. When you came in you seemed like a large flower. You have brought the whole garden in your skirt.’
