"You didn't believe them," he said hoarsely, "and you don't believe me?"
She put her hand to her heart and almost smiled.
"It hasn't come home to me yet," she said. "I don't think it ever will."
He looked helplessly toward the pistol on the table. He knew it was all over and he should not use it.
"What must I do?" he said, in the same hoarse voice.
"Get up," she said, "an' come with me. I'm a old woman but my heart's strong, an' we've been poor before. We'll go away together an' leave it all behind—all the sorrow of it an' the sin an' the shame. The life I thought you lived, my dear, is to be lived yet. Theer's places where they wont know us an' where we can begin again. Get up and come with me."
He scarcely grasped what she meant.
"With you!" he repeated. "You want me to go now?"
"Yes," she answered, "for Christ's sake, my dear, now."