"I was not asleep. I—oh nurse, is it true?"
Hope laid a firm, cool hand on the hot forehead, and looked kindly down into the wondering eyes.
"You were awake while the minister was here?"
"Yes I—I—heard it all. Is it—is it true?"
"Is what true, child?"
"That you care, that anyone cares?"
Miss Farwell's face shone now with that mother-look as she lowered her head until the sick girl could see straight into the deep gray eyes. The poor creature gazed hungrily—breathlessly.
"Now don't you know that I care?" whispered the nurse, and the other burst into tears, grasping the nurse's hand in both her own and with a reviving hope clinging to it convulsively.
"I'm not bad, nurse," she sobbed. "I have always been a good girl even when—when I was so hungry. But they—they talked so about me, and made people think I was bad until I was ashamed to meet anyone. Then they put me out of the church, and nobody would give me work in their homes, and they drove me away from every place I got, until there was no place but this, and I was so frightened here alone with all these negroes in the house. Oh nurse, I didn't want to do it—I didn't want to do it. But I thought no one cared—no one."
"They did not mean to be cruel, dear," said the nurse softly. "They did not understand. You heard the minister say they would help you now."