Seen from the apex of the big arch in the Causeway through several miles 
of bad air, the view was curiously flattened and faded, as if the whole scene 
had been woven into a fabulously complex brocade that had been allowed to 
gather dust for several decades and then been hung in front of Nell, about ten 
feet away. The sun had gone down not long before and the sky was still a dim 
orange fading up into purple, divided into irregular segments by half a dozen 
pillars of smoke spurting straight up out of the horizon and toward the dark 
polluted vault of the heavens, many miles off to the west, somewhere out in the 
silk and tea districts between Shanghai and Suzhou.