Amy and her lover were seated beside each other, not far from me. They seemed to have been talking for some time already. She was sitting behind him, on the sofa, concealed by the shadow of the evening and the shadow of the man. He was bending over, pale and vaguely outlined, with his hands on his knees. The night was still cloaked in the grey silken softness of evening. Soon it would cast off this mantle and appear in all its bare darkness. It was coming on them like an incurable illness. They seemed to have a presentiment of it and sought refuge from the fatal shadows in talking and thinking of other things. They talked apathetically about this and that. I heard the names of places and people. They mentioned a railway station, a public walk, a florist. All at once she stopped and hid her face in her hands. He took her wrists, with a sad slowness that showed how much he was used to these spells, and spoke to her without knowing what to say, stammering and drawing as close as he could to her.
