"It was my mamma, my beautiful, darling mamma! What'll I do, mister? I can't make it up to her. No way—nohow. She's gone—she's gone—"
"Easy—easy—try to keep easy."
"I used to kiss her hands when they was embroiderin'. I used to grease 'em for her all night when she screamed with the pain of 'em. I used to scream at night, too, when I was doin' my time—her there waitin'—she died alone—there waitin'—the letter they gave me the stamp for—I—I was crazy with scare when I wrote it—O God!—mamma—mamma—mamma!"
"'Sh-h-h! 'Sh-h-h! Try to keep easy."
"It was this way—O God, how was it?—it was this way—you see, me and my mamma and sometimes a friend—Cora Jones—no—no—no—Cora Kinealy—we used to sit in the lamplight—no—no—first, I was in the shoes—the children's shoes—they used to come in, little kiddies with their toes all kicked out wantin' new shoes—cute little baby-shoes that I loved to try on 'em. My friend—Cora—my friend—O God!—"
"Now, now, like a good girl—go on."
"My friend Cora—my darling little mamma—I never knew nothing about anything except me and my mamma, we—it worried her that I didn't have it like—like other girls—I—you see—you see, mister?"
"Yes, yes, I see."
Her voice, so jerked up with sobs, quieted down to a drone finally, to a low drone that talked on and on through an hour, through two. There were large, shining beads of tears flowing constantly from her cheeks, but she wiped at them unceasingly with her handkerchief and talked evenly through a new ease in her throat.
"She died, mister," she ended up finally, turning her salt-bitten eyes full upon him; "she died of that letter written when I was so full of a scared craziness from bein' in—in that place—that terrible, terrible place—but she didn't die believin' me bad. I never seen her alive again to hear it from her, but there in her—her little coffin I—I seen it in her little face, all sunk, she didn't believe it—she didn't die thinkin' me bad. Mister, did she? Did she?"