As she glanced down the car her eye caught the curtains of her husband's
berth, and she began to examine the monotonous arabesques woven through
their heavy folds. The pattern was intricate and difficult to trace; she
gazed fixedly at the curtains and as she did so the thick stuff grew
transparent and through it she saw her husband's face--his dead face. She
struggled to avert her look, but her eyes refused to move and her head
seemed to be held in a vice. At last, with an effort that left her weak
and shaking, she turned away; but it was of no use; close in front of her,
small and smooth, was her husband's face. It seemed to be suspended in the
air between her and the false braids of the woman who sat in front of her.
With an uncontrollable gesture she stretched out her hand to push the face
away, and suddenly she felt the touch of his smooth skin. She repressed a
cry and half started from her seat. The woman with the false braids looked
around, and feeling that she must justify her movement in some way she
rose and lifted her travelling-bag from the opposite seat. She unlocked
the bag and looked into it; but the first object her hand met was a small
flask of her husband's, thrust there at the last moment, in the haste of
departure. She locked the bag and closed her eyes ... his face was there
again, hanging between her eye-balls and lids like a waxen mask against a
red curtain....

She roused herself with a shiver. Had she fainted or slept? Hours seemed
to have elapsed; but it was still broad day, and the people about her were
sitting in the same attitudes as before.

A sudden sense of hunger made her aware that she had eaten nothing since
morning. The thought of food filled her with disgust, but she dreaded a
return of faintness, and remembering that she had some biscuits in her bag
she took one out and ate it. The dry crumbs choked her, and she hastily
swallowed a little brandy from her husband's flask. The burning sensation