“Do your parents object to this young man?”
“I have no parents. And my uncle, with whom I lived before I was brought to this awful place, he loves Jim. He always wanted me to marry him.”
“Take his hand, then.”
Joan felt the strong clasp of Jim's fingers, and that was all which seemed real at the moment. It seemed so dark and shadowy round these two black forms in front of her window. She heard a mournful wail of a lone wolf and it intensified the weird dream that bound her. She heard her shaking, whispered voice repeating the preacher's words. She caught a phrase of a low-murmured prayer. Then one dark form moved silently away. She was alone with Jim.
“Dearest Joan!” he whispered. “It's over! It's done!... Kiss me!”
She lifted her lips and Jim seemed to kiss her more sweetly, with less violence.
“Oh, Joan, that you'd really have me! I can't believe it.... Your HUSBAND.”
That word dispelled the dream and the pain which had held Joan, leaving only the tenderness, magnified now a hundredfold.
And that instant when she was locked in Cleve's arms, when the silence was so beautiful and full, she heard the heavy pound of a gun-butt upon the table in Kells's room.
“Where is Cleve?” That was the voice of Kells, stern, demanding.