The winter months dragged sadly and monotonously past, with their continual rains and no frost: even such snow as fell melted at once in the raw, damp atmosphere. But the wind blew all the time, kept on blowing from some mysterious cloud-realm, carrying the clouds with it, violet clouds and grey clouds, a never-ending succession, which came sailing over the trees in the Woods as though over the sea. And Constance followed them with her eyes, vaguely and dreamily, dreaming on and on in an endless reverie. The clouds sailed everlastingly on the wind; and the wind blew everlastingly, like an everlasting storm, not always raging, but always rustling, sometimes high up above the trees, sometimes straight through the trees themselves. Constance remained mostly at home and sat by her window during those short afternoons, which she lengthened out in the dim shadows of the fire-lit room, where at three o'clock dusk was falling . . . The everyday life went on, regularly and monotonously: when the weather was tolerable, Van der Welcke went bicycling; but for the rest he stayed upstairs a great deal, seldom going to the Witte or the Plaats, smoking, cursing inwardly because he was not rich enough to buy a "sewing-machine" of
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