Very strange it was out here,
the air ringing with the clamour of bells. The noise seemed
deafening, whistles blowing from the river, guns firing and this
swinging network of bells echoing through the fog. Figures, too, ran
with lights, men singing, women laughing, all mysteriously in the
tangled darkness.
They were joined at once by Aunt Anne, who said:
"God has called him home," by which Maggie understood that Mr.
Warlock was dead.
They went home in silence. Inside the hall Aunt Elizabeth began to
cry. Aunt Anne put her arm around her and led her away; they seemed
completely to forget Maggie, leaving her standing in the dark hall
by herself.
She found a candle and went up to her room. The noise in the streets
had ceased quite suddenly as though some angry voice had called the
world to order.
Maggie undressed and lay down in her bed. She lay there staring in
front of her without closing her eyes. She watched the grey dawn,
then the half-light, then, behind her blind, bright sunshine. The
fog was no more.
The strangest fancies and visions passed through her brain during
that time.
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