II-XVII

But, curiously, sitting alone, he gave little
consideration to the decision, immediate and
irrevocable, which confronted him. His
thoughts evaded, defied, him, retreated into night-like
obscurity, returned burdened with trivial and
unexpected details of memory. It grew colder, the
rich monotone of mountain and sky changed to an
impenetrable, ugly density above which the constellations
wheeled without color. His back was toward
the maple grove; the removed, disembodied
voices mingled in a sound not more intelligible than
the chorus of frogs. It occurred to him suddenly
that, perhaps, in a week, a month, he might not be
in Greenstream, nor in the mountains, but with the
white body of Meta Beggs in the midst of one of
those vast, fabulous cities the lust of which possessed
her so utterly... Or she would be gone.

He thought instinctively of the little cemetery on
the slope above the village. One by one that rocky
patch was absorbing family and familiars. Life
appeared to be a stumbling procession winding
through Greenstream over the rise and sinking into

[[252]]

p251 _ -chap- _ toc-1 _ p252w _ toc-2 _ +chap+ _ p253

v?