She had merely made a laughing-stock of him for the amusement doubtless of her obscure acquaintances! For an instant anger held him motionless; then turning quickly he walked rapidly past the fountain to the open gate.
The snow was dimly lighted on the long slope to the library; and straight ahead, in the circle beneath the statue of Washington, the bronze silhouette of a great Virginian stood sharply cut against the luminous haze of the street.

From the chimney-stack of a factory near the river a wreath of gray smoke was flung over the tree-tops, where it broke and drifted in feathery garlands.

Across the road a group of three trees was delicately etched, with each separate branch and twig, on the slate-coloured evening sky.
He had passed through the gate when a voice speaking suddenly at his side caused him to start and stop short in his walk.

A moment before he had fancied himself alone; he had heard no footsteps; and the place from where the words came was a mere vague blur in the shadows.

There was something uncanny in the muffled approach, and the sensation it produced on his nerves was like the shock he used to feel as a child when his hand was unexpectedly touched in the dark.
"I beg your pardon," he said to the vague shape at the foot of a tree.
"Did you speak to me ?" The shadows divided, and what seemed to him the edge of darkness moved forward into the dimly lighted space at his side.