I have never known what despair was, except in the tone of those words.
“I can’t keep away from it. I can’t forget it. It haunts me day and night. It’s the only thing in all the world that I am fit for, or that’s fit for me. Oh, the dreadful river!”
The thought passed through my mind that in the face of my companion, as he looked upon her without speech or motion, I might have read his niece’s history, if I had known nothing of it. I never saw, in
any painting or reality, horror and compassion so impressively blended. He shook as if he would have fallen; and his hand—I touched it with my own, for his appearance alarmed me—was deadly cold.
“She is in a state of frenzy,” I whispered to him. “She will speak differently in a little time.”
I don’t know what he would have said in answer. He made some motion with his mouth, and seemed to think he had spoken; but he had only pointed to her with his outstretched hand.
A new burst of crying came upon her now, in which she once more hid her face among the stones, and lay before us, a prostrate image of humiliation and ruin. Knowing that this state must pass, before we could speak to her with any hope, I ventured to restrain him when he would have raised her, and we stood by in silence until she became more tranquil.
“Martha,” said I then, leaning down, and helping her to rise—she seemed to want to rise as if with the intention of going away, but she was weak, and leaned against a boat. “Do you know who this is, who is with me?”
She said faintly, “Yes.”
“Do you know that we have followed you a long way to-night?”