his own. Addie went to and fro between home and school; and it was he that enlivened the meals . . .
And Constance, in her drawing-room, sat at the window and gazed at the clouds, looked out at the rain. Through the silent monotony of her short, grey days a dream began to weave itself, as with a luminous thread, so that she was not oppressed by the sombre melancholy of the rainy winter. When Van der Welcke went upstairs, cursing because it was raining again and because he had nothing to do, she settled herself in her drawing-room—in that room in which she lived and which was tinged as it were with her own personality—and looked out at the clouds, at the rain. She sat dreaming. She smiled, wide-eyed. She liked the ever louring skies, the ever drifting clouds; and, though at times the gusty squalls still made her start with that sudden catch in her throat and breast, she loved the raging and rustling winds, listened to them, content for them to blow and blow, high above her head, her house, her trees—hers—till, blowing, they lost themselves in the infinities beyond . . . She had her work beside her, a book; but she did not sew, did not read: she dreamt . . . She smiled, looking out, looking up at the endlessly rolling skies . . . The clouds sailed by, sometimes high, sometimes low, above the houses, above the people's heads, like passions disdaining mankind: dank, monstrous passions riding arrogantly by upon the passion of the winds,
