For a long while the two sisters had been in the dining-room. One of them, Juliet, embroidered tablecloths; the younger, Anna, sat quietly on the window seat, staring out at the dark street and the dark sky. Anna kept her brow pressed against the pane, but her lips moved and after reflecting a long moment, she said, “I never thought of that before.” “Of what?” asked Juliet. “It just came to me. There’s actually a city under a city. A dead city, right here, right under our feet.” Juliet poked her needle in and out the white cloth. “Come away from the window. That rain’s done something to you.” “No, really. Didn’t you ever think of the cisterns before? They’re all through the town, there’s one for every street, and you can walk in them without bumping your head, and they go everywhere and finally go down to the sea,” said Anna, fascinated with the rain on the asphalt pavement out there and the rain falling from the sky and vanishing down the gratings at each corner of the distant intersection.
