Matilda sank down in the darkness beside her window and leaned her forehead against the sooty glass. Paint peeling from clapboards, pork fat congealing on thick china, dust sifting through the vulgar meshes of coarse lace curtains, smells crowding one another through the damp tumult of the store, bolts of cross-barred gingham stuffily waiting to become high-necked dresses, two books and a picture under a pile of cotton chemises reminding one of freedoms taken in silk ... this was what she was doomed to return to. Matilda writhed there beside the window on the other side of which a city went adventuring without her. She even cried out to her mother’s Methodist God. Then something seemed to materialize close beside her--something that laid a cool shadowy hand upon her shoulder and brushed its dark velvet waistcoat against her cheek. For one ghostly moment she believed that she was her grandmother being comforted at Nohant. Then she looked up. It was as if she were aware of eyes ... mocking at first and then softly united with hers. They sat there for hours grimly enjoying an old disillusionment together. THE END Transcriber’s Notes • Italic text represented with surrounding _underscores_. • Small capitals converted to ALL CAPS. • Obvious typograpic errors silently corrected. • Variations in hyphenation, spelling, and word choice kept as in the original. (Some words seem like obvious errors, but the transcriber has compared the reprinted text here with the original publications, and the book accurately reproduced the originals.)