A woman lifted the green window-shades in her room and resentfully
blinked at the sun-plastered clamours of a street. She turned to the
bed upon which another woman reclined.
“Say, wasn’t that a nutty drunk we had last night?” she said. “Huggin’
a Bible and ravin’ about waves and mermaids and a lot of funny stuff!”
She dropped the green shade and stood against it a moment in the
smouldering gloom of the room. _Her brown hair had a drugged gentility:
its short dark curls hugged her head with despondent understanding.
Her face had been washed to an imperturbable transparency: it had the
whiteness of reclining foam overcast with a twinge of green--the sea
had lent her its skin._