The wind had fallen away, but the sky, though clearer, had a dull opaque mean appearance, and the risen moon, without glow, without refulgence, was like a brass-headed nail stuck in a kitchen wall.
The yellow blind at the widow’s cot was drawn down and the candles within cast upon the blind a slanting image of the birdcage hanging at the window; a fat dapper bird appeared to be snoozing upon its rod; a tiny square was probably a lump of sugar; the glass well must have been half full of water, it glistened and twinkled on the blind. The shadowy bird shifted one foot, then the other, and just opened its beak as Pettigrove tapped at the door.
They did not converse very easily, there was constraint between them, Pettigrove’s simple mind had a twinge of guilt.
“Will you take lime juice or cocoa?” asked the widow, and he said: “Cocoa.”
“Little or large?”
And he said: “Large.”
While they sat sipping the cocoa Caroline began: “Well, I am going away, you know. No, not for good, just a short while, for Christmas only, or very little longer. I must go.”
She nestled her blue shawl more snugly round her shoulders. A cough seemed to trouble her. “There are things you can’t put on one side for ever....”
“Even if they don’t fit in with your own ideas!” he said slyly.
“Yes, even then.”