"Please, little Rhoda, not to cry. Please, little Rhoda, tell me."
Rhoda, with her other hand, brushed the tears away.
"I'm a silly. I suppose I'm crying because I can't feel to care about anything in the world, and I wish I could. What's the use of a baby if you can't love it? What's the use of a husb—"
Lucy's hand was over her lips, and Lucy whispered, "Oh, hush, little Rhoda, hush!"
But Rhoda pushed the hand away and cried, "Oh, why do we pretend and pretend and pretend? It's Guy I care for—Guy, Guy, Guy, who's gone for good and all."
She fell to crying drearily, with Lucy's arms about her.
"But you mustn't cry," said Lucy, her own eyes brimming over; "you mustn't, you mustn't. And you do care for Peter, you know you do, only it's so hot, and you're tired and ill. If that horrible Guy was here—oh, I know he's horrible—you'd know you cared for Peter most. You mustn't say things, Rhoda; it makes them alive." Her eyes were wide and frightened as she looked over Rhoda's head out of the window.
Slowly Rhoda quieted down, and lay numb and still.
"You won't tell Peter," she said; and Lucy said, "Oh, Rhoda!"
"Well, of course I know you wouldn't. Only that you and Peter tell one another things without saying anything.... Peter belongs to you really, you know, not to me at all. All he thinks and says and is—it's all yours. He's never really been near me like that, not from the beginning. I was a silly to let him sacrifice himself for me the way he's done. We don't belong really, Peter and I; however friendly we are, we don't belong; we don't understand each other like you two do.... You don't mind my saying that, do you?" for Lucy had dropped her hands and fallen away.