The blue mist of night grew between them as they faced each other. “Tom——” she faltered now. “Why not?” her faltering nerved him. “I can do anything.... You, sister, you’ve got to be an artist—a great artist. Wait and see.”
“Do you mean it, Tom?”
He was sober,—like a panting young creature after a race for life.
“I never meant anything before. We’re going.... We’re going to-night.”
They clung heart to heart like lovers....
Curtin Rennard returned to the house and sent them all—who were there—to their rooms. Laura asked after the absent Cornelia and Tom. He struck her. The household slept in a silence like black in which many colors are lost.
Within this silence came Tom and Cornelia. Two candles burned in the room of Ruth. She sat on her bed. Her brother and sister stood. She was in her nightgown, a fat miserable woman of twenty-seven. Her body, folding and breathing, seemed a part of the heavy matting, of the rugose cover, of the thin sheet. She was stout and her voice was thin. She had fat wide arms and her nose was sharp and thin. She twirled her misshapen toes.
“Come along with us, Ruth,” said Cornelia.
“I can’t.”
“Do you like having to run over to Dahlton every time you want to see Jack?”