She was kneeling there in a sort of dull lethargy when Jason staggered back home, bowed by the weight of the crucifying revelation that Mahala always had loved him; that he had sacrificed her love; that he had thrown away the beauty of her soul and her body through his doubt of her.
As he stepped inside his door and saw Ellen kneeling beside the cradle, her unheeding head being rumpled and battered by the uncertain hands of the baby, he wondered for a moment. Then he stepped over to her and lifted her to her feet, and then he saw her distorted, pain-tortured face, and there he learned, that in some way, she knew. There was only one way in which she could know. Even then he revealed an inherent fineness. He made no accusation.
He said to her gently: “You felt that you would be needed? You followed me?”
Ellen assented. Then he was speaking again.
“You saw us? You heard what we said?”
She bowed her head in acquiescence.
Jason released her and dropped into the nearest chair, and Ellen sank down again beside the cradle and buried her face in the baby’s clothing. Finally, Jason could endure no more. He went over to Ellen and lifted her up; he helped her to a chair.
With a halting voice and stricken eyes of misery she said to him: “Because you found that pocket book when you were fixing up the house, you thought that in some way she’d had it put there?”
Jason nodded.
In the passion of her agony, she cried at him: “How could you? Any one so delicate, so beautiful—why, I have always known she never could have done it! I couldn’t have loved her if I had thought her a common thief.”