Versailles
On an afternoon in February, two months later, two girls were walking
together in the most beautiful and perhaps the most historically romantic
garden in the world, the garden of Versailles.
They had followed the long avenues known as the “Avenues of the Seasons”
and in French, as Allée de l’Été, Allée de l’Automme, Allée de l’Hiver
and Allée du Printemps, and were now seated on a small bench at the end
of the Allée du Printemps, facing a fountain.
The fountain was not playing at the present time, and yet it must have
been in action not long before. A little fringe of ice appeared at the
edges of the great basin, while the clumps of reeds, from which the spray
usually issued, were encrusted with tiny jewels of frost.
“Do you really prefer going home without me, Sally? I don’t feel I should
allow you to go alone and yet you look tired. I suppose we should not
have walked so far. I have promised to wait near the Little Trianon until
Peggy and Ralph Marshall join us. This is Ralph’s first visit to
Versailles and I am afraid if we are not there when he and Peggy arrive
they will wait on indefinitely, expecting us to appear. You will take the
tram just as I explained to you and go directly home. I should have
remembered you had been ill.”
The younger of the two American girls shook her head impatiently.
“Please give up that fallacy, Bettina; I have not been ill, I have never
been seriously ill in my life. I simply spent six weeks in the country to
satisfy Aunt Patricia and to enjoy being as lazy as I wished. Some day
perhaps I may tell you what made me unhappy after our retreat to Paris,
but not now. At present I am going to desert you not so much because I am
tired as because Peggy Webster and Ralph Marshall in their present
engaged state bore me. Goodby, I know the way to our new home perfectly
and will have no difficulty in reaching there alone. If you are late I
will make your peace with Tante. It is enough that we should have one
invalid in the family!”
And with a wave of her hand Sally Ashton departed, walking toward one of
the nearby gates which led from the great park into the town of
Versailles.
Delayed in Paris longer than she had anticipated, it was only ten days
before that Miss Patricia Lord had managed to move the Camp Fire girls
and Mrs. Burton from their pension in Paris to her furnished house at
Versailles. But no one of them had regretted the delay, having in the
interval witnessed President Wilson’s brilliant welcome by the city of
Paris and the opening of the Allied Peace Conference.
Yet this afternoon, as Bettina waited in the famous garden for the coming
of her friends, she was glad to have escaped from the turmoil and
excitement of Paris into the comparative quiet of Versailles.
All her life, except for the few persons to whom she gave her devoted
affection, Bettina had cared more for books than for human beings, which
may have partly explained her lack of interest in the social life of
Washington to which her parents’ positions entitled her.
At this moment she opened a book she had brought with her, a history of
Queen Marie Antoinette and Louis XVI. Down the long avenue she could see
the outlines of the stately palace, which had been started as a hunting
box for Louis XIII, transformed into its present magnificence by the
great Louis XIV, and been the home of the last days of the ill-fated
Louis XVI and his Queen.
Closer to where Bettina was at present seated was the Little Trianon, the
pleasure palace presented to Marie Antoinette by the King, and it was
here under a group of the famous Louisiana cypress trees that Bettina had
agreed to meet Peggy and Ralph.
She did not wish to be late for her appointment; only a few days before
Ralph had arrived in Paris on his way home to the United States and this
was his first visit to the park at Versailles. No one could say how long
he would remain in France before his orders to sail, but at least he and
Peggy had the satisfaction of having their engagement formally
acknowledged, although their marriage, because of Peggy’s youth, was
still indefinitely postponed.
Bettina did not share Sally’s attitude toward her friends. Since her
earliest girlhood she and Peggy had been singularly devoted to each
other, and although she did not believe the old friendship could continue
after Peggy’s marriage with the same degree of sympathy and affection,
nevertheless she meant to make the best of a three-cornered friendship.
It was still too early for her engagement, yet Bettina, after reading
only a few chapters, closed her book and got up. It was growing a little
cold and she would walk on toward the Little Trianon and wait in some
more sheltered place for Ralph’s and Peggy’s arrival.
As she had plenty of time she strolled along down the Avenue de Trianon,
studying the details of her surroundings with even more interest than
usual.
A little path led away from the avenue to a high stone wall.
Never before had Bettina seen either the path or the wall in her frequent
wanderings about the great Park of Versailles. A little aimlessly she now
followed the path, discovering that the wall was about six feet in height
and oval in shape with long tendrils of winter vines partly hiding it.
Strange that she had never noticed this particular wall which might
conceal some place of special interest! Yet the Park was so immense and
held so many objects of beauty and value that one might spend half a
lifetime without seeing all its treasures.
Circling the stone wall Bettina noticed a narrow opening just large
enough to permit one person to enter.
There was no one near. At the present time no visitors were allowed to
explore the great Park at Versailles without a special permit from the
French authorities. The Camp Fire girls owed their privilege to the
kindness of Monsieur Georges Duval, the French Senator who was Mrs.
Burton’s friend.
Bettina stepped up to the opening in the wall and glanced in. Inside was
an enclosed garden. In the winter time one could see that the garden was
an old and carefully tended one, which in the spring or summer would be a
place of rare loveliness.
This was probably a portion of the English garden of Queen Marie
Antoinette, about which Bettina had read. It must have also been a secret
garden, for the opening in the wall was scarcely a gateway, a narrow
section of stone had been removed, which could be restored and leave no
sign.
Without reflecting or considering whether she possessed the right to
gratify her curiosity, Bettina slipped inside the little garden.
The grass was still green, the paths carefully tended and free from
weeds. In the large flower beds the plants were covered from the winter
frosts.
The garden held a remarkable variety of shrubs and trees.
Overhead branches of the trees intertwined like long bare arms. Heavy
vines of roses formed dim canopies above white pergolas, which with the
coming of spring and summer would be bowers of flowers.
Close against the oval stone wall were carefully trimmed evergreen trees,
their eternal green a restful background for the riot of color which the
garden must offer in its seasons of blooming.
Bettina wandered farther along the footpaths which led deeper and deeper
inside the enclosure. The garden was larger than she had first believed
and more fascinating.
Finally she entered a maze, made of closely trimmed box hedge which she
had never seen in France. Some of the designs were squares, others oval
or triangular in shape. At last she came to the central design, where the
hedge had been so trimmed that the grass enclosure was in the shape of a
large heart.
Smiling Bettina stopped at this point. How romantic the little garden
appeared, shut away from the outside world of long tumult and strife!
Then suddenly she appreciated that it was growing late for her engagement
and she must cease from her romantic dreaming.
Bettina now turned and began to retrace her steps with the idea of
leaving the secret garden as soon as possible.
So absorbed had she been by her unexpected discoveries and her own
reflections that she had evidently remained longer than she intended.
Even now Peggy and Ralph were probably awaiting her. However, they would
probably not mind being alone for a little longer time.
On some other occasion, if she were allowed, Bettina felt she would like
to show them this tiny, enchanted garden. How strange to recall that
Marie Antoinette had often wandered in these same paths! And also that
with the execution of Queen Marie Antoinette and King Louis XVI, France
had begun her long struggle for liberty and equality, a struggle which
the great European war had only continued on a more worldwide scale.
But Bettina now discovered that she was not making her way out of the
labyrinth so easily as she had entered it. Twice she found that she had
wandered through the maze only to arrive again at the heart-shaped design
in the center.
Nearly a quarter of an hour Bettina expended before she reached the path
which led to the opening in the stone wall through which she had entered
into the secret garden.
Yet at the end of this path, Bettina decided that she must have made a
second mistake. The path led directly to the wall, yet there was no
opening to be seen, no sign of any gateway.
Retracing her steps she followed another path, but with the same result.
Finally she attempted to walk around the entire wall inside the garden,
searching for an opening in every available space.
It was impossible to climb the wall, the surface was too smooth and
steep, nevertheless, several times Bettina made futile attempts. Then she
tried calling for help, although recognizing the difficulty of attracting
any one’s attention.
The winter twilight was beginning to close in and in ordinary times
tourists were not permitted inside the Park after dark. Whoever had
charge of the little garden must have closed the gate and gone away for
the night.
Finally Bettina concluded that she must expect to remain inside the
secret garden for the night. There was nothing to do save to accept the
situation philosophically. She would be cold and hungry and lonely, but
many persons had lived through far greater misfortunes. The worst of her
present situation was the anxiety her failure to return home would
occasion her friends.
During the long hours before morning she must amuse herself by peopling
the little garden with the picturesque ghosts of its past.
A little after eight o’clock, having by this time decided that she could
not hope for rescue until the next day, Bettina searched until she found
the best possible shelter for the night on a little bench within a clump
of evergreens.