It stood in its
own symmetrical walled garden, like a cup in a deep saucer, and within
the wall a variety of humps and hillocks showed where the bushes
crouched beneath their unusual blanket. One window, facing towards the
railway and the river, had no balcony clinging to its stonework, and in
the dark room behind it the light of the dawn pressed faintly between
the undrawn curtains. A figure stirred upon the bed within, and Fanny,
not clearly aware whether she had slept or not, longed to search the
room for some heavier covering which, warming her, would let her sink
into unconsciousness. Her slowly gathering wits, together with the
nagging cold, forced her at last from the high bed on to the floor, and
she crossed the room towards the light. In the walled garden below
strange lights of dawn played, red, green and amber, like a crop of
flowers. The railway lines beyond the garden wall disappeared in fiery
bands north and south, lights flashed down from the sky above and winked
in the black and polished river; at the limit of the white plain beyond,
a window caught the sun and turned its burning-glass upon the snow.
"Chantilly...." A word like the dawn, filled with light and the promise
of light! Turning back into the dim room, she flung her coat upon the
bed, climbed in and fell asleep. Three hours later something pressed
against her bed and she opened her eyes again.
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