The room was mysterious, full of dusk air that thinned as the dawn stirred in it palpably, waking first Anne’s white bed, a strip of white cornice and a sheet of watery looking-glass.  Nicky’s saucer of milk gleamed white on the dark floor at Anne’s feet.  The pale ceiling lightened; and with a sliding shimmer of polished curves the furniture rose up from the walls.  Presently it stood clear, wine-coloured, shining in the strange, pure light.

And in the strange, pure light he saw Anne, in her white wrapper with the great rope of her black hair, plaited, hanging down her back.  The little black cat lay in her white lap, supported by her arm.

She smiled at Jerrold strangely.  She spoke and her voice was low and strange.

“He’s asleep, Jerry.  He kept on looking at me and mewing.  Then he tried to climb into my lap and couldn’t.  And I took him up and he was quiet then.  I think he was pleased that I took him ...  I’ve given him the morphia pill and I don’t think he’s in pain.  He’ll die in his sleep.”

“Yes.  He’ll die in his sleep.”

He hardly knew what he was saying.  He was looking at Anne, and it was as if now, at last, he saw her for the first time.  This, this was what he wanted, this mysterious, strangely smiling Anne, this white Anne with the great plaited rope of black hair, who belonged to the night and the dawn.

“I’m going to get you some tea,” he said.

He went down to the kitchen where everything had been left ready for him over-night.  He lit the gas-ring and made the tea and brought it to her with cake and bread and butter on a little tray.  He set it down beside her on the window-seat.  But Anne could neither eat nor drink.  She cried out to him.

“Oh, Jerry, look at him.  Do you think he’s dying now?”

He knelt down and looked.  Nicky’s eyes were two slits of glaze between half-shut lids.  His fur stood up on his bulging, frowning forehead.  His little, flat cat’s face was drawn to a point with a look of helpless innocence and anguish.  His rose-leaf tongue showed between his teeth as he panted.

“Yes.  I’m awfully afraid he’s dying.”

They waited half an hour, an hour.  They never knew how long.  Once he said to her, “Would you rather I went or stayed?” And she said, “Stayed, if you don’t mind.”

Through the open window, from the fields of charlock warm in the risen sun, the faint, smooth scent came to them.

Then Nicky began to cough with a queer quacking sound.  Jerrold went to her, upsetting the saucer as he came.

“It’s his milk,” she said.  “He couldn’t drink it.”  And with that she burst into tears.

“Oh, Anne, don’t cry.  Don’t cry, Anne darling.”

He put his arm round her.  He laid his hand on her hair and stroked it.  He stooped suddenly and kissed her face; gently, quietly, because of the dead thing in her lap.

It was as if he had kissed her for the first time.