Lydia looked at Dave desperately. At that moment there was a light step in the dining-room, and Margery came into the kitchen. When she saw Lydia she gasped.
"Hadn't you heard? Oh, Lydia! You came anyhow!" and suddenly Margery threw herself down and sobbed with her face in Lydia's lap.
Elviry threw her apron over her head and Dave, with a groan, dropped his head on his chest. For a moment, there was only the crackling of the fire in the stove and Margery's sobs to be heard.
Then Dave said, "What did you come for, Lydia? You only hurt yourself and you can't help us. I don't know what to do! God! I don't know what to do!"
"I don't see why everybody acts so," cried Elviry, "as if what you'd done was any worse than every one else's doings."
Margery raised her head. "Of course it's worse! A thousand times worse! I could have stood Dad's even having an Indian wife, better than this."
Dave looked at Margery helplessly and his chin quivered. Lydia noticed then how old he was looking.
"I want Margery and her mother to pack up and go away—for good," said Dave to Lydia. "I'll close up here and follow when I can. None of these cases will ever come to anything in our state court. It's the disgrace—and the way the women folks take it."
"I—I've been thinking," said Lydia, timidly, "that what you ought to do—"
Margery was sitting back on the floor now and she interrupted bitterly. "I don't see why you should try to help us, Lyd. Mother's always treated you dirt mean."