panel. Without any sound it swung quietly open. And without any
sound she stepped quietly inside.

The room was rather large and the light in it was dim. There were
no shutters, but the blinds were drawn down. Judith went to one
of the windows and drew its blind up so that the look of the
place might be clear to her. There were two windows and they
opened upon the flat roof of an extension, which suggested
somehow that it had been used as a place to walk about in. This,
at least, was what Judith thought of at once--that some one who
had used the room had been in the habit of going out upon the
roof and staying there as if it had been a sort of garden. There
were rows of flower pots with dead flowers in them--there were
green tubs containing large shrubs, which were dead also--against
the low parapet certain of them held climbing plants which had
been trained upon it. Two had been climbing roses, two were
clematis, but Judith did not know them by name. The ledge of the
window was so low that a mere step took her outside. So taking
it, she stood among the dried, withered things and looked in
tender regret at them.

"I wish they were not dead," she said softly to the silence. "It
would be like a garden if they were not dead."

The sun was hot, but a cool, little breeze seemed straying up
from among the trees of the Park. It even made the dried leaves
of the flowers tremble and rustle a little. Involuntarily she
lifted her face to the blue sky and floating white clouds. They
seemed so near that she felt almost as if she could touch them
with her hand. The street seemed so far--so far below--the whole