"Can you tell us now connectedly just what you did—and how?"
It was Mr. De Jarnette that spoke. His voice sounded stern in its intensity.
"Yes—that was what I wanted to do. That was why I sent for you both." She looked up helplessly at Mrs. Pennybacker. "Where must I begin?"
"I have told him, Rosalie, all that we know. You need not repeat that. Begin where you went to Mr. De Jarnette in his office."
"Yes. I will try very hard to tell it connectedly. But it seems to come to me in bits. Some of it stands out so much more distinctly than the rest."
She lay still a moment thinking. Then fixing her preternaturally bright eyes upon him and speaking slowly, she began:
"I had been sick for months in the hospital. But I was better then and soon would have to go away. I did not know where I could go and I worried a great deal about it. I was sorry—no, not sorry either—for there was my baby, and what would have become of him if I had died. Well, one day—the very day I was to be discharged—I saw in a paper that he, this man, had come back to Washington. After thinking it over I determined that I would go to him and ask him to settle on me enough money to let me take the child and go away somewhere where I need never trouble him any more—where I could have a little home and keep my baby with me. You see, sir, it was not that I was unwilling to work, but with the child I could not get anything to do."
Richard De Jarnette gripped the iron rail, smothering a groan.
"I went straight to him from the hospital. He was sitting at his desk cleaning his revolver—a pretty thing that seemed to catch my eye and hold it while we talked—it was so bright and shining. I remember thinking that the price of it would pay for many, many loaves of bread.... I told him what I wanted. But—I think something must have gone wrong before I came, for he was very angry—said he had thought that he was through with me—that this was blackmail. Sir, I swear to you I did not know what blackmail was. I had never heard the word."
She waited a moment to recover breath and then went on.