Here she closed
the door leading into Mrs. Jerrold's and Edith's apartment, and opened
her window wide, and held her head out in the night air--the poisonous
Roman air. The street was very quiet. Now and then some late wayfarer
passed under the light at the corner, but Mae had, on the whole, a
desolate outlook--high, dark buildings opposite, and black clouds above,
with only here and there a star peeping through.
She had taken down her long hair, thrown off her dress, and half wrapped
herself in a shawl, out of which her bare arms stretched as she leaned
on the deep window seat. She looked like the first woman--of the
Darwinian, not the Biblical, Creation. There was a wild, half-hunted
expression on her face that was like the set air of an animal brought
suddenly to bay. She thought in little jerks, quick sentences that
were almost like the barking growls with which a beast lashes itself to
greater fury.
"They treated me unfairly. They had no right. I shall choose my own
friends.
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