The man watched her. Then he fell again to staring at the ground. Fervent ejaculations occurred to him, but he uttered not a word. The histrionic had died in him.
He saw a car coming rapidly along the street. When it passed, he would get up and move on. This house, these children made him a stranger and an outcast here as he was everywhere. Why had he returned? Why had he not accepted the sentence of shame and defeat, slid on down where men rest from honor and hope, that last refuge of complete degradation?
But the car turned into the driveway, covering him with dust as it whirled past, and through the dust he beheld the face of his wife. He came to his feet and followed with a hurried, shuffling step. He was still some distance away when the driver halted before the house, then drove on out of sight.
At this moment Helen, who had been about to mount the steps, caught sight of him.
He came on, wondering if she recognized him. It was incredible that she should know him. When you have been defeated, degraded, caught the shadows of prison bars that never lift from before your vision, you do not expect recognition; you only fear it. He feared now, with a sort of truculent impotence, what might be going to happen. Still he came on with that courage of mean despair which men still show when they have fallen to the last degree of shameless shame.
Their eyes met—hers calm and steady as the horizon of a perfect day, his wavering between doubt and determination.
“Helen!”
Her lips moved as if speechless words died there.
Thus they stood, he at bay, she with the light falling upon her, grave and sweet, not condemning him, seeing in him the answer that love and fate make to such women.
“Helen,” he cried again, “are you my wife?”