“How like you,” she responded, with a touch of her old manner.  “I ask for comfort and you give me an epigram.”

“Many people find satisfaction in epigrams,” he reminded her.  “Sometimes a snap-shot is better than an oil painting.”

“Or a geometrical design, or even a map,” she continued, catching his mood.  The talk drifted to happier themes and Madame was quite herself again at dusk, when she rose to go.

On the way back, she passed Allison, returning home to dinner by a well-worn path, but he was thinking of something else and did not see her at all.

The lilac-scented midnight was starred here and there with white blooms when May went out and June came in.  Drifts of “bridal wreath” were banked against the side of the house and a sweet syringa breathed out a faint perfume toward the hedge of lilacs beyond.  Blown petals of pink and white died on the young grass beneath Madame’s wild crab-apple tree, transplanted from a distant woodland long ago to glorify her garden.

The hour was one of enchantment, yet to Rose, leaning out into the moonless night, the beauty of it brought only pain.  She wondered, dully, if she should ever find surcease; if somewhere, on the thorny path ahead, there might not be some place where she could lay the burden of her heartache down.  Her pride, that had so long sustained her, was beginning to fail her now.  It no longer seemed more vital than life itself that Allison should not know.

She had the hurt woman’s longing for escape, but could think of no excuse for flight.  She knew Aunt Francesca would manage it, in some way, should she ask, and that she would be annoyed by no troublesome questions, yet loyalty held her fast, for she knew how lonely the little old lady would be without her.

Day by day, the tension increased almost to the breaking point.  June filled the garden with rosebuds, but their pale namesake in the big white house took no heed of them.  She no longer concerned herself about her gowns, but wore white almost constantly, that her pallor might not show.

The roses broke from their green sheaths, then bloomed, opening their golden hearts to every wandering bee.  The house was full of roses.  Aunt Francesca wore them even on her morning gowns and Isabel made wreaths of red roses to twine in her dark hair.  Every breeze brought fragrance to the open windows and scattered it through the house.

Madame’s heart ached for Rose, but still she said no word, though it seemed to her that the blindness of the others could not last much longer.  She could not take Rose away unless she took Isabel also, and, should she do that, things would soon be just as they were now.

As Rose faded, Isabel blossomed into the full flower of her youth.  Her high, bird-like laugh echoed constantly through the house and garden, whether anyone was with her or not.  With sinking heart, Rose envied her even a tithe of her abundant joy.