"You see," she went on, "no one would have blamed me if I had gone on like that—the misshapen children, and soon they would have stopped having souls—and Jude's cruelty,"—again that fearsome catch in the voice—"they would have called me good—if I had stayed on—but you will understand?" She bent toward him with pleading and yearning in her face. "Oh! how I have just hungered to talk it over with you—and to feel sure! There isn't any one else in all the world, you know, to whom I could say this."
"How about Gaston?" Drew heard his own words, and they sounded brutal, but they were forced from him.
Joyce stared surprisedly.
"Why—we never talk of—of that. How could we? But I read—and Mr. Gaston has taught me to think—straight—and don't you notice how much better I talk?"
"Yes—and dress." All that was hard in Drew rose in arms. This girl was like the rest of her kind for all her wood-setting and strange beauty. The only puzzling thing in the matter was her desire to talk it out with him.
"I have lots of pretty things to wear." Joyce smoothed her heavy cloak. "He's the kindest man I ever knew. That's another reason I had for wanting to come to you. I want you to show him just how you understand. I begin to see how lonely he is—how lonely he has always been up here—there is no one quite like him—but you. But Mr. Drew, do you remember what you preached that day you—married us—Jude and me, I mean?"
"I'm afraid not—so many things have happened since." Drew tried to keep his feelings in check.
"Well, I remember every word." The glowing face again bent toward Drew. "Can't you think back? It was about what we've brought into the world, what we get here and shape into our lives, and then what we leave when we go—away. The blazed trail, you know, and clearing the way for others. Oh, it was the sort of thing that when you thought about it you didn't dare go on being careless."
"I do—recall." Her intensity was gripping Drew in spite of himself. "It was an old fancy. But it has helped me to live."
"It has made me live. I tried it fair and honest with Jude, Mr. Drew, but no one could do it with him. The trail got choked with—awful things—and I only had strength enough to run away, after one year. If I had stayed—I—I would have rotted as I stood." She breathed thick and fast. Her old life, even in memory, smothered her. Drew caught a slight impression of what it must have been for this strange-natured woman. He began to think she was not yet awake, and the thought made him kinder in his estimate of her.