“Yes.”
“Then I'm going to tell you the rest, for I think I haven't much longer time to tell anything.”
“Oh, nonsense!” I protested; but it was lip speech only, and he smiled at the pretense.
“Of course, nonsense, if you like. But I'll go, shriven of that secret. The wicker chair is where She used to sit.”
“That much I gathered.”
“How can I describe Her to you? How can I make you understand as you would if you'd seen Her?”
“Perhaps I have.”
“When? Where?”
“Sitting with you on a bench in the Square the week the lilacs bloomed. She looked afraid.”
“She was. A brute of a foreman had insulted her. So she lost her job as a feather finisher—did you see her beautiful hands?—and she could find no other, and there was nobody in the world for her to turn to. Down below her last dollar, and twenty years old, and lovely. There's terror enough in that, isn't there?”