"A fool of a boy, Rosey dear," said the old voice, as she took her place by the bed again. "Just a fool of a boy, to keep them all those years. And she married to another fellow, and a great-grandmother. Ah, well!... don't you cry about it, Rosey.... All done now!" She may have heard him wrong, for his voice went to a whisper. She wondered at the way the cough was sparing him.
Then she thought he was falling asleep again; but presently he
spoke. "I shall do very well now.... Nothing but a little rest ... that's all I want now. Only there's something I wanted to say about ... about...."
"About Sally?" Rosalind guessed quickly, and certainly.
"Ah ... about the baby. Your baby, Rosey.... That man that was her father ... he's on my mind...."
"Oh me, forget him, dear—forget him! Leave him to God!" Rosalind repeated a phrase used twenty years ago by herself in answer to the old soldier's first uncontrollable outburst of anger against the man who had made her his victim. His voice rose again above a whisper as he answered:
"I heard you say so, dear child ... then ... that time. You were right, and I was wrong. But what I've said—many a time, God forgive me!—that I prayed he was in hell. I would be glad now to think I had not said it."
"Don't think of it. Oh, my dear, don't think of it! You never meant it...."
"Ah, but I did, though; and would again, mind you, Rosey! Only—not now! Better let him go, for Sallykin's sake.... The child's the puzzle of it...."
Rosalind thought she saw what he was trying to say, and herself tried to supplement it. "You mean, why isn't Sally like him?"