"I've decided to cut it out," replied she carelessly. "There's nothing in it."
"I couldn't live without it—and wouldn't."
"It is a comfort when one's on the way down," said she. "But
I'm going to try the other direction—for a change."
She held a box of cigarettes toward him. He took one, then she; she held the lighted match for him, lit her own cigarette, let the flame of the match burn on, she absently watching it.
"Look out! You'll burn yourself!" cried he.
She started, threw the match into the slop jar. "How do you feel?" inquired she.
"Like the devil," he answered. "But then I haven't known what it was to feel any other way for several months except when I couldn't feel at all." A long silence, both smoking, he thinking, she furtively watching him. "You haven't changed so much," he finally said. "At least, not on the outside."
"More on the outside than on the inside," said she. "The inside doesn't change much. There I'm almost as I was that day on the big rock. And I guess you are, too—aren't you?"
"The devil I am! I've grown hard and bitter."
"That's all outside," declared she. "That's the shell—like the scab that stays over the sore spot till it heals."