From afar, and in the dimming light, Em thought she caught a glimmer, a window shut or opening, a signal just for her, slicing into her iris. It was as Cocteau had predicted: in full apprehension of that lost and useless innocence, the mountains cast upon the vale a deep shadow. There in the vast fortress of thallic imaginings, and in the growing void she thought an oud or a swift nomenclature might be beckoning. Time as she reckoned shifted back an hour, then forward to set its domain over the land, and over her and every small being with or without fur, with or without lineage or language. In the light of afternoon, the highway before Em was a cutpiece for a musical play, or a queenly procession. Now the mosses hanging from the oakes drew the virulent and repetitive night around her. She grew sleepy and blind in the tonneau, but heard the far-off echo of a lonely train whistle. She grew sleepy, and thought she heard the complaint of a bass viol. She grew sleepy and thought she heard the warble of a vireo, hoped that the touch on her hand was a brush of green leaf. There was every reason to believe that a gay and prosperous future lay ahead of her, yet she felt uncertain in the lonely night.
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