"When we get back to the Basin then you will be tired of staying there in the bleak and cold. You will never wait for me to pay you; you will laugh at me, and you will go back to the world."
"Vesty!"
Wearily she turned her heavy eyes on me—a ghost; there was the forced, unconscious cry in them of the child, or even of the woman.
Sacredly I shielded their glance, and ghostly; it was as though I had not seen.
"You mistake my courage. There is no winter," I said, smiling, "strong enough to drive me from the Basin."
XXII
"NEIGHBORIN'"
Vesty never said "Stay!" but that unconscious look in her eyes made a sort of forlorn fireplace of hope to me, desolate, open to all the winds. As God wills. I wait.
I went often to Captain Leezur; the nervine lozenges were potent.