The stumpy trees on
either side with the bright new green of the spring seemed to be
concealing lamps within their branches. So thick a glow suffused the air
that it was as though strangely coloured fruit, purple and orange and
amethyst, hung glittering against the pale yellow sky, and the road
running up the hill was like pale wax.
On the other side Orange Street tumbled pell-mell into the roofs of the
town. The monument of the fierce Georgian citizen near which Joan was
standing guarded with a benevolent devotion the little city whose lights,
stealing now upon the air, sprinkled the evening sky with a jewelled haze.
No sound broke the peace; no one came nor went; only the trees of the Lane
moved and stirred very faintly as though assuring the girl of their
friendly company.
Never before had she so passionately loved her town. It seemed to-night
when she was disturbed by her new love, her new fear, her new worldly
knowledge, to be eager to assure her that it was with her in all her
troubles, that it understood that she must pass into new experiences, that
it knew, none better indeed, how strange and terrifying that first
realisation of real life could be, that it had itself suffered when new
streets had been thrust upon it and old loved houses pulled down and the
river choked and the hills despoiled, but that everything passes and love
remains and homeliness and friends.
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