“She died,” Latimer continued, in dull confession, “in a log cabin in the mountains of North Carolina. She died in anguish—the mother of an hour-old child.”
“My God! My God! My God!”
Three times the cry broke from Baird.
He got up and walked across the room and back.
“Wait—wait a moment!” he exclaimed. “For a moment don’t go on.”
As the years had passed, more than once he had been haunted by a dread that some day he might come upon some tragic truth long hidden. Here he was face to face with it. But what imagination could have painted it like this?
“You think my lie—a damnable thing,” said Latimer.
“No, no!” answered the other man, harshly. “No, no!”
He moved to and fro, and Latimer went on.
“I never understood,” he said. “She was a pure creature, and a loving, innocent one.”