se everything outside was strangely silent; as
the hot hours of midday and early afternoon went by there was no note of
bird-music, nor any sound of wind in the elm-tops. Just a little breeze
stirred from time to time, enough to make the slats of the half-drawn
Venetian blind rattle faintly. Earlier in the day there had come in from
the window the smell of dew-damp earth, but now that had been sucked up
by the sun.

Close beside the window, with her back to the light and facing the bed,
which projected from one of the side walls out into the room, sat Lady
Ashbridge's nurse. She was reading, and the rustle of the turned page
was regular; but regular and constant also were her glances towards the
bed where her patient lay. At intervals she put down her book, marking
the place with a slip of paper, and came to watch by the bed for a
moment, looking at Lady Ashbridge's face and listening to her breathing.
Her eye met Michael's always as she did this, and in answer to his
mute question, each time she gave him a little head-shake, or perhaps a
whispered word or two, that told him there was no change. Opposite the
bed was the empty fireplace, and at the foot of it a table, on which
stood a vase of roses. Michael was conscious of the scent of these every
now and then, and at intervals of the faint, rather sickly smell of
ether. A Japan screen, ornamented with storks in gold thread, stood
near the door and half-concealed the washing-stand. There was a chest
of drawers on one side of the fireplace, a wardrobe with a looking-glass
door on the other, a dressing-table to one side of the window, a few
prints on the plain blue walls, and a dark blue drugget carpet on
the floor; and all these ordinary appurtenances of a bedroom etched
themselves into Michael's mind, biting their way into it by the acid of
his own suspense.

Finally there was the bed where his mother lay. The coverlet of blue
silk upon it he knew was somehow familiar to him, and after fitful
gropings in his mind to establish the association, he remembered that it
had been on the bed in her room in Curzon Street, and supposed that it
had been brought here with others of her personal belongings. A little
core of light, focused on one of the brass balls at the head of the bed,
caught his eye, and he saw that the sun, beginning to decline, came in
under the Venetian blind. The nurse, sitting in the window, noticed
this also, and lowered it. The thought of Sylvia crossed h