ETHAN FROME
coasting, and there hung the lamp to light them! He looked out at the slopes bathed in lustre, the silver-edged darkness of the woods, the spe tral purple of the hills against the sky, and it seemed as though all the beauty of the night had been poured out to mock his wretchedness . . .
He fell asleep, and when he woke the chill of the winter dawn was in the room. He felt cold and stiff and hungry, and ashamed of being hungry. He rubbed his eyes and went to the window. A red sun stood over the gray rim of the fields, behind trees that looked black and brittle. He said to himself: "This is Matt's last day," and tried to think what the place would be without her.
As he stood there he heard a step behind him and she entered.
"Oh, Ethan—were you here all night?"
She looked so small and pinched, in her poor dress, with the red scarf wound about her, and the cold light turning her paleness sallow, that Ethan stood before her without speaking.
"You must be frozen," she went on, fixing lustreless eyes on him.
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