Judith was looking directly into Baird's eyes, and she saw how curiously they widened and grayed. She watched the blood drain from his face. In spite of the passions warring in her, Judith's love for Baird was a very complete thing. She suffered as she watched him. She felt that she had hurt him terribly.
Baird moved at last, looked down at the floor. "I can't realize it—at once—all it means—" he muttered.
Judith continued. "You see, Nickolas, Edward was only a boy, he was only twenty-one, and he was madly in love with Marian Penniman—and she with him. She was a very pretty girl, with Ann's same dangerous allure about her. You know the family quarrel? They met secretly—my father knew nothing about it, neither did Mr. Penniman—until it was too late. Edward was a nice boy, he loved Marian and he wanted to marry her. There was fearful trouble. Mr. Penniman and my father quarreled violently. My father swore that no Westmore should marry a Penniman, and Mr. Penniman was as determined that no daughter of his should owe anything to a Westmore. Edward would have run away with her if he could, but Mr. Penniman guarded his house with a shotgun, and between them all they married Marian to her cousin, Coats Penniman, just to save her good name. Coats loved her—he honestly wanted to help her, so it was a marriage only in name. It was a wretched business. It killed Marian, I believe, and it almost killed Edward." Judith's voice quivered with deep feeling. "Poor Edward!... And, in the end, he's sacrificed for his family's sins—"
Baird had heard Judith's explanation, his senses mechanically grasped what she said, while he pondered the thing which was of such tremendous import to him. When Judith had finished, he was still pale, but collected enough.
He looked very steadily at Judith when he asked his questions. "Did Garvin know Ann's relationship to him?"
"No. Mr. Penniman, Coats and Sue, and Edward and myself—we were the only ones who knew.... And Ben Brokaw knew. I think Ben guessed rather than knew—way back in the beginning. And from the beginning he's been like a father to Ann, I mean in feeling—much more so than Coats."
"And Ann didn't know?"
"Not till Edward told her. Ben says Edward told her, for the first time, on the afternoon of his death.... I don't know just what Edward had in mind for her—certainly to take her away from the farm, and perhaps to adopt her. I know he would never have made the truth known—he would guard the Westmore name too carefully for that."
There was coldness in Judith's assertion, a discounting of Ann. Judith Westmore had the southern aristocrat's pitiless contempt for the illegitimate. It was the heritage of the negro, the curse of the South, but why think about it? Nothing would have compelled her to countenance Ann.
Baird understood, but he made no comment. He prepared to go, and smiled when he took Judith's hand. "Thank you for telling me—you have done me a kindness. It's settled that we next meet in Paris, and happily, I hope.... By the way, I must have your address."