"Say, I nearly fell dead, then, for that just described the woman; but I'm no loon, so I just kept still.
"'What's their name?' says she, as we walked along.
"'Davis,' says I; an' mercy to heaven! I didn't know I was tellin' a lie.
"All of a sudden she laughed out loud—the awfullest laugh. It sounded as harrable mo'rnful as a sea-gull just before a storm.
"'Husband!' she flings out, jeerin'; 'I had a husband once. I worshipped the ground he trod on. I thought the sun raised an' set in him. He carried me on two chips for a while, but I didn't have any children, an' I took to worryin' over it, an' lost my looks an' my disposition. It goes deep with some women, an' it went deep with me. Men don't seem to understand some things. Instid of sympathizin' with me, he took to complainin' an' findin' fault an' finally stayin' away from home.
"'There's no use talkin' about what I suffered for a year; I never told anybody this much before—an' it wa'n't anything to what I've suffered ever since. But one day I stumbled on a letter he had wrote to a woman he called Ruth. He talked about her red wavy hair an' blue eyes an' baby mouth an' the way she smiled like an angel. They were goin' to run away together. He told her he'd heard of a place at the end of the earth where a man could make a lot of money, an' he'd go there an' get settled an' then send for her, if she was willin' to live away from everybody, just for him. He said they'd never see a human soul that knew them.'
"She stopped talkin' all at once, an' we walked along. I was scared plumb to death. I didn't know the woman's name, for he always called her 'dearie,' but the baby's name was Ruth.
"'You've got to feelin' bad now,' says I, 'an' maybe we'd best not go on.'
"'I'm goin' on,' says she.
"After a while she says, in a different voice, kind of hard, 'I put that letter back an' never said a word. I wouldn't turn my hand over to keep a man. I never saw the woman; but I know how she looks. I've gone over it every night of my life since. I know the shape of every feature. I never let on, to him or anybody else. It's the only thing I've thanked God for, since I read that letter—helpin' me to keep up an' never let on. It's the only thing I've prayed for since that day. It wa'n't very long—about a month. He just up an' disappeared. People talked about me awful because I didn't cry, an' take on, an' hunt him.