“Pray for your soul—and mine!”
“Jim! Oh Jim!... Will you kill yourself, too?”
“Yes! But pray, girl—quick!”
“Then I pray to God—not for my soul—but just for one more moment of life... TO TELL YOU, JIM!”
Cleve's face worked and the gun began to waver. Her reply had been a stroke of lightning into the dark abyss of his jealous agony.
Joan saw it, and she raised her quivering face, and she held up her arms to him. “To tell—you—Jim!” she entreated.
“What?” he rasped out.
“That I'm innocent—that I'm as good—a girl—as ever.. ever.... Let me tell you.... Oh, you're mistaken—terribly mistaken.”
“Now, I know I'm drunk.... You, Joan Randle! You in that rig! You the companion of Jack Kells! Not even his wife! The jest of these foul-mouthed bandits! And you say you're innocent—good?... When you refused to leave him!”
“I was afraid to go—afraid you'd be killed,” she moaned, beating her breast.