because I've been scared--because he's in a common jail--waiting to be
tried for murder." Her face contracted slightly. "I suppose it's the way
I've been brought up."

"But Sue----"

"Don't stop me, Billy, let me talk!" And she talked on intensely, so
absorbed in this fierce impulsive confession that she seemed to forget I
was there. "I've been thinking what's to become of me. I've been
thinking about all the things I've been in, and none seem real any
longer--I wanted a thrill and I got it--that's all. Then I met Joe and I
got it again, I got a thrill out of all his life and the big things it
was made of. I got a _great_ thrill out of the strike. Don't you
remember how I talked three weeks ago when you were here? Dad was the
Old and I was the New. I saw everything beginning. I read Walt Whitman's
'Open Road' and I felt like Joe's 'camarado.' Well, and I kept on like
that. And like a little idiot I couldn't keep it to myself, I went and
told some of my friends. That's what's really the hardest now, what
hurts the most--I told my friends. I posed as a young Joan of Arc. I
was going to marry, give up everything, chuck myself into this fight for
the people, into revolution! Thrills, I tell you, thrills and thrills!

"But then Joe got arrested. I knew he was in a cell in the Tombs, in
Murderers' Row. And that drove all the thrills away. That was real. Dad
made it worse. He talked about the coming trial, Sing Sing and the death
house there. One morning he tried to read to me an account of an
execution. I ran away, but I came back and read it myself, I read all
the hideous details right up to the iron chair. And just because there
was a chance of Joe's being like that, all at once I stopped loving him.
Not just because I was frightened, it wasn't so simple as a scare. It
was something inside of me shuddering, and saying 'how revolting!' I
tried to shake it out of me, I tried to keep on loving him! But I
couldn't shake it out of me! Joe had become--revolting, too! It's
because of the way I've been brought up and because of the way I've
always lived! I can't stand what's real--if it's ugly! That's me!"

She broke off and looked down. I came and sat beside her, and took her
cold, quivering hands in mine:

"I guess I _am_ sorry, Sue old girl----"

"Don't be," she retorted. "I'm too sorry for myself as it is! That's
another part of me!" Again she broke off with a hard little laugh.
"Let's forget me for a minute. What has t