Mrs. Cortlandt stared about the squalid cell dully.
"Miss Garavel! Why didn't you tell me? Why isn't she here? Why does she leave you alone? No, no! You hardly know each other. Why, she's not old enough to know her own mind—"
"But I know my mind, and I love her."
Her white hands strained at each other as she steadied her shaking voice. "Love!" she cried. "You don't know what love means, nor does she. She CAN'T know, or she'd be here, she'd have this prison torn block from block."
"I suppose her father would not let her come," said Kirk, slowly, but Edith did not seem to hear him. The realization of her broken hopes was coming home to her poignantly.
"My happiness!" she exclaimed. "I have been unhappy so long! And I seemed to see it just within my reach. Oh, Kirk, she thinks you are guilty, she hasn't faith."
"You have no right to say that."
"See! I came to you when I was married and asked you to take me; I'll do the same with you now."
"You don't know what you're saying. You're hysterical, Mrs. Cortlandt. I love Gertrudis so deeply that there's no room in me for anything else, and never will be. Heaven only knows what they have made her believe about me, but I don't care; I'll upset this little plot of Alfarez's, and when she learns the truth she will come back again."
"This little plot!" Edith cried, in distraction. "And I suppose you wish me to give you back to her?"