The early frost has turned all the flowers in the garden brown. The dahlias, the same dahlias that witnessed the master’s timid attempt at making love, are all scorched, and so are the big sunflowers that used to stand guard outside the kitchen door. Nothing is left in the desolate flower beds save here and there a few wretched geraniums and five or six clumps of asters, and they, too, are hanging their heads, already touched with the colour of decay. In Captain Mauger’s garden, the borders which I saw just now over the hedge, are completely ruined, and everything is the colour of tobacco. Everywhere the trees are beginning to turn yellow and lose their leaves, and the sky is gloomy. For the last four days we have been living in a thick brown fog, that smelt of soot and still hung about, even in the afternoon. Now it is raining, an icy, stinging rain, blown in sudden squalls by a sharp wind from the north-west. For me, it is no joke. My bedroom is as cold as ice. The walls scarcely keep out the wind and the rain is coming in through cracks in the roof, especially above the sash windows that shed a meagre light into this gloomy attic and the rattle of loose slates, and the sudden gusts of wind, and the noise of straining beams and creaking hinges is deafening.
What do You think about The Diary Of A Chambermaid?
