"I thank you, Ruth," he said, "but don't you see I had better not give folks any occasion to think of me at all just now? The gossips need only to be reminded of my being alive, and they will begin all over again."
"Tom," I asked him desperately, "are you never going to get over this bitter feeling? I can't bear to have you go on thinking that everybody is talking about you."
"I don't blame them for talking," was his answer.
I assured him he would have been pleased if he could have heard the way in which Mr. Turner spoke of him yesterday.
"Oh, Cy! he is too good-hearted to fling at anybody."
"But Deacon Richards was just as friendly," I insisted.
"Yes, he would be. It isn't the men, Ruth; they are ready to give a fellow a chance; but the women"—
He did not seem to know how to finish his sentence, and I reminded him that I too was a woman.
"Oh, you," responded Tom, "you're an angel. You might almost be a man."