"Frale, are you there?" Her voice was low as if she feared other ears than his might hear.
He did not move again, and speak he could not, for remembrance rushed back stiflingly and overwhelmed him. Descrying his white face in the shadow, a pity as deep as his shame filled her heart and drew her nearer.
"Why, Frale, come out here. No one can see you, only me."
Still tongue-tied by his emotion, he came into the light and stood near her. In dismay she looked up in his face. The big boy brother who had taken her to the little Carew Crossing station only two months before, rough and prankish as the colt he drove, but gentle withal, was gone. He who stood at her side was older. Anger had left its mark about his mouth, and fear had put a strange wildness in his eyes—but—there was something else in his reckless, set lips that hurt her. She shrank from him, and he took a step closer. Then she placed a soothing hand on his arm and perceived he was quivering. She thought she understood, and the soft pity moistened her eyes and deepened in her heart.
"Don't be afraid, Frale; they're gone long ago, and won't come back—not for a while, I reckon."
He smiled faintly, never taking his eyes from her face. "I hain't afeared o' them. I hev been, but—" He shook her hand from his arm and made as if he would push her away, then suddenly he leaned toward her and caught her in his arms, clasping her so closely that she could feel his wildly beating heart.
"Frale, Frale! Don't, Frale. You never used to do me this way."
"No, I never done you this-a-way. I wisht I had. I be'n a big fool." He kissed her, the first kisses of his young manhood, on brow and cheeks and lips, in spite of her useless writhings. He continued muttering as he held her: "I sinned fer you. I killed a man. He said he'd hev you. He 'lowed he'd go down yander to the school whar you war at an' marry you an' fetch you back. I war a fool to 'low you to go thar fer him to foller an' get you. I killed him. He's dade."
The short, interrupted sentences fell on her ears like blows. She ceased struggling and, drooping upon his bosom, wept, sobbing heart-brokenly.
"Oh, Frale!" she moaned, "if you had only told me, I could have given you my promise and you would have known he was lying and spared him and saved your own soul." He little knew the strength of his arms as he held her. "Frale! I am like to perish, you are hurting me so."