Elvine shook her head. Her eyes were turned from the girl. They were staring down into the turbulent stream.
"I don't think I've found it that way."
"How?"
The interrogation was natural. But it brought Elvine's eyes sharply to the girl's, and, for a moment, they gazed steadily into each other's.
Then the woman's graceful shoulders went up.
"I see you know."
"And—you aren't mad with me for knowing? You aren't mad with Jeff for me knowing? I wanted you to know I knew. I wanted to tell you I knew, only I didn't just know how to tell you. Then I wanted to tell you—something else."
There was simple sincerity in every word the girl spoke. The light in her eyes was shining with truth. Elvine saw it, and knew these things were so, and, in her loneliness of heart, in her brokenness of spirit, she welcomed the chance of leaning for support upon a soul so obviously strong and sympathetic. She yielded now as she would never have believed it possible to yield.
Suddenly she raised her hands to her head and pressed her fingers to her temples.
"Oh, I—I don't know what to do. I sort of feel I just can't—can't stop around. And yet—— Oh, I love him so I can't, daren't leave him altogether. You can't understand, child, no one can. You—oh, you've never known what love is, my dear. I'm mad—mad for him. And—and I can never come into his life again."