The Project Gutenberg EBook of Pointed Roofs, by Dorothy Richardson

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Title: Pointed Roofs
Pilgrimage, Volume 1

Author: Dorothy Richardson

Release Date: January, 2002 [Etext #3019]
Posting Date: October 27, 2009

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK POINTED ROOFS ***

Produced by Christopher Hapka

POINTED ROOFS

PILGRIMAGE, Volume 1

By Dorothy Richardson

CHAPTER I

1

Miriam left the gaslit hall and went slowly upstairs. The March twilight
lay upon the landings, but the staircase was almost dark. The top
landing was quite dark and silent. There was no one about. It would
be quiet in her room. She could sit by the fire and be quiet and think
things over until Eve and Harriett came back with the parcels. She would
have time to think about the journey and decide what she was going to
say to the Fraulein.

Her new Saratoga trunk stood solid and gleaming in the firelight.
To-morrow it would be taken away and she would be gone. The room would
be altogether Harriett's. It would never have its old look again. She
evaded the thought and moved clumsily to the nearest window. The outline
of the round bed and the shapes of the may-trees on either side of
the bend of the drive were just visible. There was no escape for her
thoughts in this direction. The sense of all she was leaving stirred
uncontrollably as she stood looking down into the well-known garden.

Out in the road beyond the invisible lime-trees came the rumble of
wheels. The gate creaked and the wheels crunched up the drive, slurring
and stopping under the dining-room window.

It was the Thursday afternoon piano-organ, the one that was always in
tune. It was early to-day.

She drew back from the window as the bass chords began thumping gently
in the darkness. It was better that it should come now than later on, at
dinnertime. She could get over it alone up here.

She went down the length of the room and knelt by the fireside with one
hand on the mantel-shelf so that she could get up noiselessly and be
lighting the gas if anyone came in.

The organ was playing "The Wearin' o' the Green."

It had begun t