"I was young--and very foolish, I suppose."
With that confession, spoken with simple dignity, she broke off again.
Clearly, some knowledge of the past she deemed it necessary to
impart to me. If she halted over her words, it was rather to dismiss
what was irrelevant to the matter in hand, in which she sought my
counsel.
"I did not see him for four years--did not wish to.... And he
vanished completely.... Four years!--just a welcome blank!"
Her shoulders lifted and a little shiver went over her.
"But even a blank like that can become unendurable. To be always
dragging at a chain, and not knowing where it leads to...." Her
hand slipped from the gold cross on her breast and fell to the other
in her lap, which it clutched tightly. "Four years.... I tried to
make myself believe that he was gone forever--was dead. It was
wicked of me."
My murmur of polite dissent led her to repeat her words.
"Yes, and even worse than that. During the past month I have
actually prayed that he might be dead.... I shall be punished for it."
I ventured no rejoinder to these words of self-condemnation. Joyce,
I reflected, mundanely, had clearly swept her off her feet in the
ardour of their first meeting and instant love.
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