The Truants. A. E. W. Mason

matter so much. The horse was regretfully given up. It might come later, he must get elected first, never mind how. In a word, he was as good as a Deputy already. And from a Deputy to the President of the French Republic, the step after all was not so very long. "Though I am not quite sure that I approve of Republics," said Pamela, very seriously.

      However, that was the best she could do in the way of mapping out his future, and the schoolmaster listened, seeing the world through her eyes. Thus three winters passed and Pamela learned a very little history.

      Towards the end of the third winter the history books were put away. Pamela was now eighteen and looking eagerly forward to her first season in London. And no doubt frocks and hats occupied more of her thoughts than did the fortunes of the schoolmaster. Some remorse for her forgetfulness seized her the day before she went away. It was a morning of spring, and the schoolmaster saw her coming down the dark narrow streets towards him. She was tall beyond the average, but without ungainliness, long of limb and lightly built, and she walked with the very step of youth. Her dark hair swept in two heavy waves above her forehead, and was coiled down behind on the back of her neck. Her throat rose straight and slim from the firm shoulders, and her eyes glowed with anticipation. Though her hair was dark, she was not sallow. Her face was no less fresh and clear than were her eyes, and a soft colour like the bloom of a fruit brightened her cheeks. In that old brown street she shone like a brilliant flower, and Giraud, as he watched her, felt all at once that he could have no place in her life, and in his humility he turned aside. But she ran after him and caught him up.

      "I am going to-morrow," she said, and she tried to keep the look of happiness out of her eyes, the thrill out of her voice. And she failed.

      "It is good-bye, then," said he.

      "For a little while. I shall come back to Roquebrune in December."

      The schoolmaster smiled.

      "I shall look forward from to-day until that month comes. You will have much to tell me."

      "Yes, shan't I?" she cried; and then, lest her eagerness should hurt her friend, she added, "But I shall not forget our quiet afternoons on the garden terrace."

      The recollection of them, however, was not strong enough to check either her thoughts or their utterance. Later on perhaps, in after years, she might in her musings return to that terrace and the speculations they indulged in, and the fairy palaces they built, with an envy of the ignorance and the high thoughts of youth. To-day she was all alert to grasp the future in her hands. One can imagine her looking much as she looked in those portraits of her childhood.

      "News of the great world," she cried. "I shall bring it back. We will talk it over in Roquebrune and correct our guesses. For I shall know."

      As a fact, they never did talk over her news, but that she could not foresee. She went on her way with a smile upon her face: all confidence and courage, and expectation, a brilliant image of youth. Giraud, as he watched her the proud poise of her head, the light springing step, the thing of beauty and gentleness which she was, breathed a prayer that no harm might come to her, and no grief ever sadden her face.

      The next morning she went away, and the schoolmaster lost his one glimpse of the outer world. But he lived upon the recollections of it, and took again to his long walks on the Corniche road. The time hung heavily upon his hands. He hungered for news, and no news came, and when in the month of December he noticed that the shutters were opened in the Villa Pontignard, and that there was a stir of servants about the house, he felt that the shutters were being opened after a long dark time from his one window on the outside world. He frequented the little station from that moment. No "Rapide" passed from France on its way to Italy during his leisure hours but he was there to watch its passengers. Mrs. Mardale came first, and a fortnight afterwards Pamela descended from a carriage with her maid.

      Giraud watched her with a thrill of longing. It was not merely his friend who had returned, but his instructor, with new and wonderful knowledge added to the old.

      Then came his first chilling moment of disillusion. It was quite evident that she saw him as she was stepping on to the platform. Her eyes went straight to his--and yet she turned away without the slightest sign of recognition and busied herself about her luggage. The world had spoilt her. That was his first thought, but he came to a truer understanding afterwards. And indeed that thought had barely become definite in his mind, when she turned again, and, holding out her hand, came to him with a smile.

      "You are well?" she said.

      "Yes," said he.

      And they walked up the long flight of steps to Roquebrune, talking banalities. She gave him none of the news for which he longed, and they spoke not at all of the career which together they had mapped out for him. All their long talks upon the terrace, their plans and their speculations seemed in an instant to Giraud to have become part of a pleasant, very foolish, and very distant past. He was aware of the vast gulf between them. With a girl's inimitable quickness to adapt herself to new surroundings, she had acquired in the few months of her absence the ease, the polish, and the armour of a woman of the world. He was still the village schoolmaster, the peasant tortured with vain aspirations, feeding upon vain dreams; and in this moment he saw himself very clearly. Her silence upon their plan helped him to see himself thus. Had she still believed in that imagined career, surely she would have spoken of it. In a word, he was still looking at the world through her eyes.

      "You must come up to the villa," she said. "I shall look forward to your coming."

      They were in the little square by the schoolhouse and he took the words for his dismissal. She went up the hill alone and slowly, like one that is tired. Giraud, watching her, could not but compare her with the girl who had come lightly down that street a few months ago. It dawned upon him that, though knowledge had been acquired, something had gone, something perhaps more valuable, the elasticity from her step, the eagerness from her eyes.

      Giraud did not go up to the villa of his own accord, but he was asked to lunch in a week's time, and after lunch Pamela and he went out into the garden. Instinctively they walked down to that corner on the point of the bluff which overhung the ravine and the white torrent amongst the oleanders in its depths. They had come indeed to the bench on which they used to sit before Pamela was quite aware of the direction their steps had taken. She drew back suddenly as she raised her head.

      "Oh no, not here," she cried, and she moved away quickly with a look of pain. Giraud suddenly understood why she had turned away at the railway station. Here they had dreamed, and the reality had shown the dreams to be bitterly false, so false that the very place where they had dreamed had become by its associations a place of pain. She had needed for herself that first moment when she had stepped down from the carriage.

      "The world must be the home of great troubles,' said Giraud, sadly.

      "And how do you know that?" Pamela asked with a smile.

      "From you," he replied simply.

      The answer was unexpected. Pamela stopped and looked at him with startled eyes.

      "From me? I have said nothing--nothing at all."

      "Yet I know. How else should I know except from you, since through you alone I see the world?"

      "A home of great troubles?" she repeated, speaking lightly. "Not for all. You are serious, my friend, this afternoon, and you should not be, for have I not come back?"

      The schoolmaster was not deceived by her evasion. There had come a gravity into her manner, and a womanliness into her face, in a degree more than natural at her years.

      "Let us talk of you for a change," said she.

      "Well, and what shall we say?" asked Giraud, and a constraint fell upon them both.

      "We must forget those fine plans," he continued at length. "Is it not so? I think I have learnt that too from you."

      "I hare said nothing," she interrupted quickly.

      "Precisely," said he, with a smile. "The school at Roquebrune will send no Deputy to Paris."

      "Oh!