"I did not come," she said, moving out from her position between the bed and the wall, "to see you or to ask mercy or forgiveness of you. You need not reproach me for being alive; because only I fainted, you should not have seen me to-night; you should never have seen me again, for I was on my way to my grave, where I could not go without looking on my child once more. The announcement of my death came only a little while before its time. I shall not see another day."
Her voice was dull and hoarse, the features wasted and pinched, and mottled with marring blotches of scorbutic red.
"This is no place for us to talk," he said, pointing to the child on the bed. "Follow me."
She hesitated.
"I do not want to talk with you; I wish to spare you. I know you would be justified in killing me. But I would not have you suffer because you wish me dead. I shall not trouble you or the world with another day of my wretched life. Cover your face, and let me kiss the boy again, and I will go. I know my way to the river, and I would spare you any harm that might come to you of my dying here--at your hands."
"This is no place, I say, for such a scene or for such words. Follow me."
"You will not kill me?"
"I will not harm you, poor soul."
"Your pity harms me worse than blows."
"Then I will not pity you. Come."