‘Oh, Jennifer——’ Judith clutched her hand and was speechless. After a while she added: ‘I shall feel I haven’t quite lost you. Your lovely bowl. It’s always seemed such a part of you.’
‘It’s all of me,’ whispered Jennifer. ‘I leave it to you.’
The momentary lightness was now past, vanishing as swiftly as it had come. There was now such a sense of approaching desolation as had never been before in life. This was the end.
‘Then I must say good-bye,’ said Judith.
‘Draw back the curtain.’
Judith obeyed. As she went to the window she felt Jennifer’s eyes upon her.
The night was frosty, dark and still, and the midnight stars glittered in trembling cold multitudes over the arch of the sky. Below the window the unmoving trees made a blot of yet profounder darkness. Across the court, the opposite wing of the building was just distinguishable, a mass impenetrably deep; but there were no lights in the windows: not even in Mabel’s. Everybody in College was asleep.
‘Oh!’ sighed Jennifer. ‘The smell of the limes, and the nightingales! I’d like to have had them once again.’
Judith let the curtain drop and came quickly and sank on her knees by the bed.
‘Then come back, Jennifer, and have them with me. Why not, why not? You’ll be well by next term. Everything will be forgotten. Our last term ... Jennifer!’