But--after love what comes?
A scene that lours,
A few sad vacant hours,
And then, the Curtain.
I daresay Mrs. Paley is the only one of us who can really understand
that."
"We'll ask her," said Hirst. "Please, Hewet, if you must go to bed, draw
my curtain. Few things distress me more than the moonlight."
Hewet retreated, pressing the poems of Thomas Hardy beneath his arm,
and in their beds next door to each other both the young men were soon
asleep.
Between the extinction of Hewet's candle and the rising of a dusky
Spanish boy who was the first to survey the desolation of the hotel in
the early morning, a few hours of silence intervened. One could almost
hear a hundred people breathing deeply, and however wakeful and restless
it would have been hard to escape sleep in the middle of so much sleep.
Looking out of the windows, there was only darkness to be seen. All over
the shadowed half of the world people lay prone, and a few flickering
lights in empty streets marked the places where their cities were
built. Red and yellow omnibuses were crowding each other in Piccadilly;
sumptuous women were rocking at a standstill; but here in the darkness
an owl flitted from tree to tree, and when the breeze lifted the
branches the moon flashed as if it were a torch. Until all people should
awake again the houseless animals were abroad, the tigers and the stags,
and the elephants coming down in the darkness to drink at pools.
Pages:
134
135
136
137
138
139
140
141
142
143
144
145
146
147
148
149
150
151
152
153
154
155
156
157
158