There was a dead calm, and the mercury was fourteen degrees below zero.

Everything seemed in the white region of death after the delirium of storm.

That morning Madelon Hautville, after her household tasks were done, sat down again to sew her wedding-dress.

The silk was of changeable tints, and flashed in patches of green and gold as it lay over her knee and swept around her to the floor.
All the others had gone, but presently, as she sewed, Richard came in with some parcels.

He had been on an errand to the store.