Life seemed to mock at her; it offered the wrong opportunities, it
strewed her path with chances of which no human being could judge the
value until the choice had been made; it was like walking over ground
pitted with hidden holes, it needed luck as well as skill to avoid a
fall. But, like other people, she had to pursue her road: the thing
was to hide her bruises, even from herself, and shake off the dust.
She had by this time reached the track which was connected with so
much of her life, and she drew rein in astonishment. They were felling
the trees. Already a space had been cleared and men and horses were
busy removing the fallen trunks; piles of branches, still bravely
green, lay here and there, and the pine needles of the past were now
overlaid by chippings from the parent trees. What had been a still
place of shadows, of muffled sounds, of solemn aisles, the scene of a
secret life not revealed to men, was now half devastated, trampled,
and loud with human noises. It had its own beauty of colour and
activity, there was even a new splendour in the unencumbered ground,
but Rose had a sense of loss and sacrilege. Something had gone. It
struck her that here she was reminded of herself. Something had gone.
The larch trees which had flamed in green for her each spring were
dead and she had this strange dead feeling in her heart.
She saw the figure of Francis Sales detach itself from a little group
and advance towards her.
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