“I don't have to ask if you have been in prison,” she said gravely. “Your face shows it.”
“I—I came out—three months ago,” was the halting admission.
Mary watched the shrinking figure reflectively for a long minute before she spoke again. Then there was a deeper resonance in her voice.
“And you'd made up your mind to go straight?”
“Yes.” The word was a whisper.
“You were going to do what the chaplain had told you,” Mary went on in a voice vibrant with varied emotions. “You were going to start all over again, weren't you? You were going to begin a new life, weren't you?” The bent head of the girl bent still lower in assent. There came a cynical note into Mary's utterance now.
“It doesn't work very well, does it?” she asked, bitterly.
The girl gave sullen agreement.
“No,” she said dully; “I'm whipped.”
Mary's manner changed on the instant. She spoke cheerfully for the first time.