“Still thou hast not told me the true meaning of a friend,” she said, presently, and again Everett became aware that somehow he had lost the gift of speech.
“Perhaps I cannot find words to make the meaning of friendship plain,” he said, finally, “but I will try to teach you what the word implies.”
“Nay, Stephen Everett, it is not right that thou shouldst teach me anything, since thou art of the world, to which thou wilt soon return.”
“The world will never be the same to me after I leave Zanah,” said Everett.
“Hast thine eyes been opened to its wickedness?”
“No. Since I came to the colony I have thought little of the world, but my eyes have been opened to some things to which they were blind before—things that do not belong to the every-day world.”
Again he was afraid to let himself look at Walda, and he appeared to be addressing Piepmatz. Walda did not reply to him. She was thinking again of the life beyond the bluffs.
“Often have I tried to imagine what life must be outside of Zanah,” Walda remarked, by-and-by, after a long silence. “Now and then stray memories come back to me, for thou knowest I was born in the world, and that I was a little child who brought to the colony recollections of another existence. It is these memories that compel me oftentimes to pray that I may be spared temptation which should never assail a woman of Zanah.”
“Surely no temptation could come to you,” said Everett.
“Thou knowest little of a woman’s heart. The seeds of vanity are here,” she said, folding her hands upon her breast. “I find pleasure in the flowers and the pretty things that God hath made.”