she thought and lay tranquil. There was not a
sound. "I shall never be able to sleep down here, it's too awful," she
murmured, and puffed and shifted her head on the pillow.

The Win-ter may--pass.... The win-ter... may pass. The winter may ...
pass. The Academy... a picture in very bright colours... a woman sitting
by the roadside with a shawl round her shoulders and a red skirt and red
cheeks and bright green country behind her... people moving about on the
shiny floor, someone just behind saying, "that is plein-air, these
are the plein-airistes"--the woman in the picture was like the
housekeeper....

A brilliant light flashed into the room... lightning--how strange the
room looked--the screens had been moved--the walls and corners and
little beds had looked like daylight. Someone was talking across the
landing. Emma was awake. Another flash came and movements and cries.
Emma screamed aloud, sitting up in bed. "Ach Gott! Clara! _Clara!_" she
screamed. Cries came from the next room. A match was struck across the
landing and voices sounded. Gertrude was in the room lighting the
gas and Clara tugging down the blind. Emma was sitting with her hands
pressed to her eyes, quickly gasping, "Ach Clara! Mein Gott! Ach Gott!"
On Ulrica's bed nothing was visible but a mound of bedclothes. The whole
landing was astir. Fraulein's voice called up urgently from below.

10

Miriam was the last to reach the schoolroom. The girls were drawn up on
either side of the gaslit room--leaving the shuttered windows clear.
She moved to take a chair at the end of the table in front of the saal
doors. "Na!" said Fraulein sharply from the sofa-corner. "Not there! In
full current!" Her voice shook. Miriam drew the chair to the end of the
room of figures and sat down next to Solomon Martin. The wind rushed
through the garden, the thunder rattled across the sky. "Oh, Clara!
Fraulein! Nein!" gasped Emma. She was sitting opposite, between Clara
and Jimmie with flushed face and eyes strained wide, twisting her linked
hands against her knees. Jimmie patted her wrist, "It's all right,
Emmchen," she muttered cheerfully. "Nein, Christina!" jerked Fraulein
sharply. "I will not have that! To touch the flesh! You understand, all!
That you know. All! Such immodesty!"

Miriam leaned forward and glanced. Fraulein was sitting very upright
on the sofa in a shapeless black cloak with her hands clasped on her
breast. Near her was Ulrica in her trailing whit