Tottered off

…she was an apparition, she signaled that all the prophecies had been accomplished, her gown was blacker than if it had actually been black, if it had actually been a gown.

every other consideration fell away. Maybe it was this purposefulness which got him through the blood-letting alive, though bullets filled the air like flies. His very indifference was a kind of blessedness. What he failed to notice, failed in turn to notice him. Thus he went unscathed through the heart of the battle

“The world was full of young men who accepted their destinies lightly the way one wears a wristwatch, without much conscious thought. But his destiny was a plaster cast.”

Remember on this one thing, said Badger. The stories people tell have a way of taking care of them. If stories come to you, care for them. And learn to give them away where they are needed. Sometimes a person needs a story more than food to stay alive. That is why we put these stories in each other's memories. This is how people care for themselves.

…and her end was in darkness. She moved from one mystery into another.

“How ungenerously in later life we disclaim the virtuous moods of our youth, living in retrospect long, summer days of unreflecting dissipation. There is no candor in a story of early manhood which leaves out of account the home-sickness for nursery morality, the regrets and resolutions of amendment, the black hours which, like zero on the roulette table, turn up with roughly calculable regularity.”

It was getting light outside. The new grey pale light came into the room, making the candle desolate, making the figures into different ghosts.