It was a moment before Augusta Maturin could answer her.
"What are friends for, Janet," she asked, "if not to share sorrow with? And do you suppose there's any place, however bright, where sorrow has not come? Do you think I've not known it, too? And Janet, I haven't sat here all these days with you without guessing that something worries you. I've been waiting, all this time, for you to tell me, in order that I might help you."
"I wanted to," said Janet, "every day I wanted to, but I couldn't. I couldn't bear to trouble you with it, I didn't mean ever to tell you. And then—it's so terrible, I don't know what you'll think."
"I think I know you, Janet," answered Mrs. Maturin. "Nothing human, nothing natural is terrible, in the sense you mean. At least I'm one of those who believe so."
Presently Janet said, "I'm going to have a child."
Mrs. Maturin sat very still. Something closed in her throat, preventing her immediate reply.
"I, too, had a child, my dear," she answered. "I lost her." She felt the girl's clasp tighten on her fingers.
"But you—you had a right to it—you were married. Children are sacred things," said Augusta Maturin.
"Sacred! Could it be that a woman like Mrs. Maturity thought that this child which was coming to her was sacred, too?
"However they come?" asked Janet. "Oh, I tried to believe that, too! At first—at first I didn't want it, and when I knew it was coming I was driven almost crazy. And then, all at once, when I was walking in the rain, I knew I wanted it to have—to keep all to myself. You understand?"