For an instant Nita hesitates, then she says: "Yes, I believe so. Yes--but what wrong can you have done?"
"I--oh, nothing; naturally, it is no question of me," assures Mascha, hastily. "Only when one lives so alone, and has no one to whom one can speak, all sorts of thoughts come to one. It is foolish----"
"No!" cries out Nita, hastily. "It is not foolish, it is sad. How could one leave you with those uncongenial people this long, long time?"
Mascha only silently shrugs her shoulders.
"But now it is over. You will be happy. You will again be healthy and happy."
"Yes," murmurs Mascha, scarcely audibly--"happy--healthy!"
"If I only knew you far away from this dusty sultriness," says Nita, "somewhere where it is shady, cool, where fresh roses bloom each day, where the air is almost as fresh in the evening as it is in the morning. You long to be away?"
"Yes," murmured Mascha, "I long to be away--away from the houses, from people, from the heat, far away, anywhere where it is cool, very cool!"
"Poor heart, my poor little darling!"
After a while Mascha whispers: "Do you remember how, the first time I came here, I was afraid of the skull? You were so dear and good to me. I loved you from that moment."