Valancy looked dully about her old room. It, too, was so exactly the same that it seemed almost impossible to believe in the changes that had come to her since she had last slept in it. It seemed—somehow—indecent that it should be so much the same. There was Queen Louise everlastingly¹ coming down the stairway, and nobody had let the forlorn puppy in out of the rain. Here was the purple paper blind and the greenish mirror. Outside, the old carriage-shop with its blatant² advertisements. Beyond it, the station with the same derelicts and flirtatious³ flappers.

 

Here the old life waited for her, like some grim ogre that bided⁴ his time and licked his chops. A monstrous⁵ horror of it suddenly possessed⁶ her. When night fell and she had undressed and got into bed, the merciful numbness⁷ passed away and she lay in anguish⁸ and thought of her island under the stars. The camp-fires—all their little household jokes and phrases and catch words—their furry⁹ beautiful cats—the lights agleam on the fairy islands—canoes skimming over Mistawis in the magic of morning—white birches shining among the dark spruces like beautiful women’s bodies—winter snows and rose-red sunset fires—lakes drunken with moonshine—all the delights of her lost paradise. She would not let herself think of Barney. Only of these lesser¹⁰ things. She could not endure to think of Barney.

 

Then she thought of him inescapably. She ached for him. She wanted his arms around her—his face against hers—his whispers in her ear. She recalled all his friendly looks and quips and jests—his little compliments—his

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