"Why?" he asked softly.
"Because," the fair head was lowered, not in timidity, but in deep thought, "because I want it—my baby—to look like that one. I look and look at the picture, and I dream about it at night. I know every little dimple and the soft curls—and all. I pray and pray, and if God answers—then—" a gentle ferocity rang through the hurried words—"I'm going to keep it so. It's going to be different from any other little child in St. Angé. And it all fits in, now that Mr. Drew is coming back. It's just wonderful! It was Mr. Drew that set me thinking about leaving something better for them as come after. He said terrible strange things—but you can't forget them, can you? I've been—well, sort of weeding out my life ever since he was here—and there can't be so much—for my baby to do—if I clear out my own faults. Can there?"
The girl's absolute ignoring of any reason for withholding this confidence from him at first staggered Gaston, and then steadied him.
Never before had Joyce so appealed to him, but the sacredness of the position she had thrust upon him for a moment appalled him. He looked intently at the girlish, innocent face. What he saw was a blind woman, groping through the child, seeking a reality that evaded it.
Never greatly impressed with his own importance, Gaston became cruelly aware, now, that in a marked way he still was the one being in the girl's world to whom she looked for guidance. The knowledge made him withdrawn for an instant.
Drew had appealed to her spirit—but he was elected Father Confessor, Judge and General Arbiter of her daily life. For a moment Gaston's sense of the ridiculous was stirred. Suppose they—those—people who inhabited the Past, and peopled the possible Future—suppose they should know of this? The eyes twinkled dangerously, but the girl in the glow of the red fire was terribly in earnest.
"You are perfectly happy, Joyce?" It was an inane question, but like some inane questions it touched a vital spark.
"Why, if I get on the top of the things that might make me unhappy if they conquered me; and if I shut my ears and eyes—why, then, I guess I'm perfectly happy. I won't let myself feel sad any more, and I make believe a lot—about Jude. You have to when you've been married long; and I guess he has to about me. So you see, living that way it comes out all right. And then when you have beautiful things, like this house, and the books and pictures, and some one ready to help—like you—why those things I just hold up in the light all the time. Isn't that being happy?"
"What a philosopher!" Gaston bent forward and again pressed the slim shoulder. The piteousness of this young wife getting her happiness, all unknowingly, by self-imposed blindness of the inner soul, clutched at his heart.
"Hold hard to that, Joyce," he said. "Hold fast to that. Let all the light in that you can upon your blessings, and as to other things, why, don't acknowledge them! You're on the right track, though how you've struck it so early in the game, beats me."