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, the country spread to the sky unbroken, except where rows of dreary houses, shadowy without the twinkle of a light, stood on some new land; this was not the fashionable road, and it was empty. How pure and cool it was! In the city, there was straggling moonlight, darkened by the brick walls, but no moon; out here, the moon had just broken from a bank of cloud low down, piled on a bank of snow, all looking snowy and alike, the horizon line being hardly distinguishable; the light poured from the edge in a shining flood, and rippled without a sound over the crisp, crusted snow--all of one kin, cold, sparkling, desolate.
Jane noted nothing of this; she walked dizzily along the road. Only one day since morning, after living a whole lifetime in that! She scooped up a handful of snow, and rubbed it furiously into her face and eyes, they burned so; her eyes were dry, melting the snow without feeling wet any. Clear back in the morning, Margery Eames met her; then the day dragged along as if it never would go, and she ate nothing but the tears she swallowed; going down those steps, through that dreadful door, waiting on those tables--the evening, till Will Prescott came in. She had wanted so to have what others had, to study, to paint--such things as she had seen, and she couldn't make a stroke! to learn to sing, as she had heard them sing in the churches; to see Germany, that her mother had told her about; she wanted to be loved--not like father and Nobby, but another way too; she had a right to have such things--other people had them. He had praised her, stroked her hair; said she was too pale, but no matter, she'd brighten up by and by; she was his little bluebell he had found in the woods, that he was going to make over into a red rose; she should have everything she wanted, and go with him everywhere, pretty soon--only be patient; if he could wait, couldn't she? And she had been patient, without telling father about it, though somehow he found out; she had waited in the road an hour more than once fo