"How?"

The interrogation was natural. But it brought Elvine's eyes sharply to
the girl's, and, for a moment, they gazed steadily into each other's.

Then the woman's graceful shoulders went up.

"I see you know."

"And--you aren't mad with me for knowing? You aren't mad with Jeff for
me knowing? I wanted you to know I knew. I wanted to tell you I knew,
only I didn't just know how to tell you. Then I wanted to tell
you--something else."

There was simple sincerity in every word the girl spoke. The light in
her eyes was shining with truth. Elvine saw it, and knew these things
were so, and, in her loneliness of heart, in her brokenness of spirit,
she welcomed the chance of leaning for support upon a soul so obviously
strong and sympathetic. She yielded now as she would never have believed
it possible to yield.

Suddenly she raised her hands to her head and pressed her fingers to her
temples.

"Oh, I--I don't know what to do. I sort of feel I just can't--can't stop
around. And yet---- Oh, I love him so I can't, daren't leave him
altogether. You can't understand, child, no one can. You--oh, you've
never known what love is, my dear. I'm mad--mad for him. And--and I can
never come into his life again."

She dropped her hands from her head in a movement that to Nan seemed as
though she were wringing them. Nan's own heart was thumping in her
bosom. She, too, could have cried out. But her eyes steadily, and
almost tenderly, regarded the woman who had taken Jeff from her.

"You must stop around," she said in a low, firm tone. "Say, Evie, I
don't guess I'm bright, or clever, or anything like that. I don't reckon
I know things different to other folk. But just think how it would be if
you went away now. You'd never see Jeff again, maybe, and he'd never
know just how you love him. You see, men-folk are so queer, too. Maybe
Jeff's right, and you and me are wrong. Maybe we're right, and he's all
wrong. I can't say. But I tell you Jeff needs you now--more than ever.
He don't know it, maybe. But he wants you, and if you love him you'll
just--stand by. Oh, I could tell you of a thousand ways you can help
him. A thousand ways you can show him your love without telling him. It
means a hard fight for you. I know. And maybe you'll think he isn't
worth it. But he is--to you. You love him. And any man a woman loves
is worth to her every sacrifice she can make. I don't know. Maybe you
got to