My aunt is no more.

There is only left of her something indistinct, struck down, of subterranean color, and her place is desolate.

Now, close to her, I am alone! Alone--magnified by my affliction, master of my future, disturbed and numbed by the newness of the things now beginning.

At last the window grows pale, the ceiling turns gray, and the candle-flames wink in the first traces of light.
I shiver without end.

In the depth of my dawn, in the heart of this room where I have always been, I recall the image of a woman who filled it--a woman standing at the chimney-corner, where a gladsome fire flames, and she is garbed in reflected purple, her corsage scarlet, her face golden, as she holds to the glow those hands transparent and beautiful as flames.