She told him of Stoneswell, the brick city. She was born there, in that place where rubble was laid on to rubble and became architecture. The streets were paved with gold, she said, that was what travellers believed. But it was not so. They were only paved with stone. In the Eastern Quarter the factories belched smoke and it hung over that part of the city in great clouds. In the North Quarter everybody had money and fine dresses and spoke like they were royalty, and many of the stones were painted white and silver and pale blue, yet it was still only stone.
