. . .
And Julio, in his special delivery letter, had proposed meeting in this
place, supposing that it would be as little frequented as in former
times. She, too, with the same thoughtlessness, had in her reply, set
the usual hour of five o'clock, believing that after passing a few
minutes in the Printemps or the Galeries on the pretext of shopping, she
would be able to slip over to the unfrequented garden without risk of
being seen by any of her numerous acquaintances.
Desnoyers was enjoying an almost forgotten sensation, that of strolling
through vast spaces, crushing as he walked the grains of sand under
his feet. For the past twenty days his rovings had been upon planks,
following with the automatic precision of a riding school the oval
promenade on the deck of a ship. His feet accustomed to insecure
ground, still were keeping on terra firma a certain sensation of elastic
unsteadiness. His goings and comings were not awakening the curiosity of
the people seated in the open, for a common preoccupation seemed to
be monopolizing all the men and women. The groups were exchanging
impressions. Those who happened to have a paper in their hands, saw
their neighbors approaching them with a smile of interrogation. There
had suddenly disappeared that distrust and suspicion which impels the
inhabitants of large cities mutually to ignore one another, taking each
other's measure at a glance as though they were enemies.
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