The Swing of the Pendulum by Adriana Spadoni

The porter dimmed the lights for the night. In the berth above a man snored, and across the aisle an old woman breathed in gasping squeaks. Jean pulled up the blind, and, propped on her pillow, stared into the night and tried not to hear. But the breathing of the crowded car was persistent and grouped itself into strange rhythms and chords that stripped away spiritual differences and leveled the sleepers to a common physical need.

Jean remembered how she had lain so, her first night in a sleeper, ten years before, and how the hot, dark intimacy had excited her. How near she had felt to some mystery, as if she were just about to penetrate some exciting secret. Even the blackness of the prairie had quivered with it. The red and green semaphores, uncannily obedient to a hidden power, had winked their inclusion in the great adventure. The lonely little stations, specks of light in the night, had been so friendly and knowing. Now they hurt, so bravely and uselessly battling against the engulfing darkness, the thick, limitless blackness of the prairie.