“Pray thee to sleep,” gently the Japanese woman persuaded her.
She was quiet a moment, only to start up the next.
“Nay,” entreated Aoi, “sleep first—to-morrow speak. Rest, I pray you.”
“It was so long, so long!” cried the woman on the bed, clasping her thin hands across those on her head. “And, oh, the pain, the agony of it all! I was so tired—so—”
Her body palpitated and quivered with the sighing sobs that shook her. She sprang up suddenly, pushing away from her the hands of Aoi, which gently attempted to restrain her.
“It was all wrong—quite wrong from the first. But what did they care? They had their wedding. Ah, I tell you, they are bad, all bad! Ah, it was cruel, cruel!”
“Ah,” thought Aoi, sadly; “she, too, has been pierced with anguish. Truly, my heart breaks in sympathy with her.”
She bent above the quivering woman, her pitying face close to hers.
“Pray thee, dear one, take rest and comfort,” she said, smoothing softly her brow.
“Ah, you are so good, so good,” said the sick woman. “You are not like those others—those fearful people.” She covered her eyes with her thin hands as if to shut out a vision of some horror. “God will bless you, bless you for your goodness to me,” she said.