The Climber

It was a warm still night early in May, and the electric light over the cabstand at the end of the square cast on to the pavement and dusty surface of the dry roadway the elbowed and angular shadows of the still leafless plane-trees, in unwavering lines, as if they were made of some dark marble cunningly inlaid into a grey ground. The dried seed-balls of last year still hung there, and the air was only sufficient to stir them, so that they oscillated gently to and fro, swinging from side to side in the light breeze that was not strong enough to agitate the twigs and branches that bore them.