Kate went on as though she found relief in talking. Her voice sounded thick, somehow, and lifeless with suffering.
“I have such a feeling of heaviness, of oppression”—she laid her hand upon her heart—“I can’t describe it. If I were superstitious I’d say it was a premonition.”
“Of what, for instance?” Mrs. Toomey looked frightened.
Kate shook her head.
“I don’t know. The thought keeps coming that, bad as things have been, there are worse ahead of me—unhappiness—more unhappiness—like a preparation for something.”
Distinctly impressed, Mrs. Toomey exclaimed inanely:
“Oh, my! Do you think so?” Was she going to get “mixed up” in something, she wondered.
“I have a dread of the future—a shrinking such as a blind person might have from a danger he feels but cannot see. Your friendship is the only bright spot in the blackness—it’s a peak, with the sun shining on it!” Kate’s eyes filled with quick tears. They were swimming as she raised them and looked at Mrs. Toomey.
“I’m glad you feel that way,” Mrs. Toomey murmured.
Something in the tone arrested Kate’s attention, an unconvincing, insincere note in it. She fixed her eyes upon her face searchingly, then she crossed the room swiftly and dropped upon her knees beside her. Taking one of her thin hands between both of hers she said, pleadingly: