She gave the lamp a shake to force a bit of light and said in her resigned tone, instinctively but unconsciously touching my horrible thought: "Wipe your eyes, dear ... the dead have to be forgotten...."
XV
The storm raked the streets and stunned the houses.... All night long it raged; and once the thunder crashed so close by that I jumped out of bed terror-stricken to make sure the shutters were closed.
The morning dawned sullen, dragging lazy, gray wings on the earth and taking flight only at the furious onslaught of the wind.
To comb my hair I seated myself close to the window with my face to the mirror on the wall.
Outside, the downpour and incessant sharp rattle, the blue-lacquered roofs, the wan drift of the clouds. In front of me, an image which had my name.
The more eager a woman is to please, the less she sees herself in the mirror. What she sees is the idea others have of her, a sort of consciousness of her power, the irrepressible desire to attract.
When I sat down before the glass just now, I must have seen myself; suddenly I felt afraid.
I had raised the tumble of ringlets from my forehead and saw a gleam—my first white hair. Then I scanned my face closely, pitilessly. At the outer corners of my eyes a place was preparing for a fine meshwork which would close up when I laughed.
A mad need fell upon me—to see myself again and again. Around each corner of my mouth an invisible line had chosen its pathway; the perfect oval of my face slipped slightly from its frame; under the chin there was an imperceptible mass which would never yield to any amount of massage.