The cloud came nearer. It took its clothes off and was a woman. As she walked closer, she saw the gypsies were staring at her naked back. She didn't believe in such things. Things like an absence of nakedness. But she drew up her shawl a little closer. The dogs turned timid and cried.Trees don't grow now, only grass and the white lilies. The caravans have smothered any excess. The wheels, the wheels. The caravans dot the earth for some miles. The earth moans. The woman changes her clothes again, and again. The clothes are all borrowed. She pays for them like rent. It is all modern, after all.Her bag is huge, filled with scarves and shoes.She looks for clothes in which she can dance. The dogs feel empty, the gypsies watch on in fascination. She isn't ugly, she is a cat of an impossible colour. Her breasts are white lilies. When they cannot bear the pain of her changing nakedness, they lend her a leaning caravan.The gypsies wait in anticipation, they drape themselves around with fire flies. Summer to winter, the present turns to past. Some months, of course; the caravans have made a circle around the woman's. Some lovers in love with her, verses about her back, some knocks on her door, the decay of empty roses. The anticipation.At last the woman came out dressed. She looked almost a girl, like her age moved backwards; she moved like a girl, the way of the mermaids. Her hair was done up in pigtails. She was resourceful; shards of glass glittered in her hair like stars. She had found some antlers in her bed, she had made herself a crown. The lovers went home to masturbate. It felt ever so disturbing, a grumbling there was; most of them died in the act.The fear was inexplicable. The world sounded with music, grapes grew from grass. Before it grew into an epidemic, the wiser of the gypsies decided to kill her. Their eyes moved up and down her body. They would smother her but open the pigtails first. She looked too beautiful. Their hands hesitated, moved. In that moment, the girl let her scarf drop.It rained all night and destroyed everything. Water was in their caravans, too much water. Everyone woke up in a groan, even the dead ones. It couldn't be a dream; so much money had been spent on the funerals! The lilies drooped; the gypsies couldn't find the girl the next morning. Only the scarf, the shoes, the clothes. The fireflies were missing all the coming nights.The gypsies moved away from the flood and the stale air, they resolved never to look at clouds again.