A few bees lingering with the summer hummed outside.

The fire crackled bravely; an old hound, blind and past work, lay warming its hide on the hearth.

I could think of nothing more, and I stood and stood and watched the man set out the table and spread the cloth.
'For how many, Monsieur ?' he asked in a scared tone.
'For five,' I answered; and I could not help smiling at myself.
For what would Zaton's say could it see Berault turned housewife?
There was a white glazed cup, an old-fashioned piece of the second Henry's time, standing on a shelf.

I took it down and put some late flowers in it, and set it in the middle of the table, and stood off myself to look at it.

But a moment later, thinking I heard them coming, I hurried it away in a kind of panic, feeling on a sudden ashamed of the thing.