“Everything. I’m dead to her, and there’s nothing left.”
Marian rocked herself to and fro, the same strange sound breaking out once and again.
“It’s hard to give up one’s own child,” she moaned; “hard—hard to lose her altogether. I didn’t know I had before—not like this. But it’s my own doing. I’ve brought it on myself. She doesn’t want me—doesn’t want me! O, my Joan!”
Jervis drew his chair a pace or two nearer, and laid a hand on Marian’s arm.
“Polly, my dear, don’t give way like this,” he said. “Tell me what you mean. Tell me what’s gone wrong.”
Marian looked in his face with another sob.
“I’ve lost my child,” she said; “and nothing in the world is left to me!”
There was a short pause, broken only by Jervis’ audible breathing. Then he spoke—
“But, Polly, my dear sister, heaven is left. God loves you still.”
“Does he? But if I can’t believe it, after all I’ve done?” she said, with haggard eyes.