eeling as if her lips were frozen. Yet
for three hours she laughed and talked with people. Mrs. Williams was at
the reception; several times they were in the same group. Oh, it was all
unreal--terrible--just a thing to drive through. There was a moment at
the last when Edith clung to her, and when it seemed that she could not
do the terrible thing she was going to do, that she was _not_ going to
do it--that the whole thing was some hideous nightmare. She wanted to
stay with Edith. She wanted to be like Edith. She felt like a little
girl then, just a frightened little girl who did not want to go away by
herself, away from everything she knew, from people who loved her. She
did not want to do that awful thing! She tried to pretend for a moment
she was not going to do it--just as sometimes she used to hide her face
when afraid.

At last it was all over; she had gone to the train and seen Edith and
Will off for the East. Edith's face was pressed against the window of
the Pullman as the train pulled out. It was Ruth she was looking for; it
was to Ruth her eyes clung until the train drew her from sight.

Ruth stood there looking after the train; the rest of their little group
of intimate friends had turned away--laughing, chattering, getting back
in the carriages. Deane finally touched Ruth's arm, for she was standing
in that same place looking after the train which had now passed from
sight. When he saw the woe of her wet face he said gruffly: "Hadn't we
better walk home?" He looked down at her delicate slippers, but better
walk in them than join the others looking like that. He supposed walking
would not be good for that frail dress; and then it came to him, and
stabbed him, that it didn't much matter. Probably Ruth would not wear
that dress again.

She walked home without speaking to him, looking straight ahead in that
manner she all along had of ruthlessly pressing on to something; her
face now was as if it were frozen in suffering, as if it had somehow
stiffened in that moment of woe when Edith's face was drawn from her
sight. And she looked so tired!--so spent, so miserable; as if she ought
to be cared for, comforted. He took her arm, protectingly, yearningly.
He longed so in that moment to keep Ruth, and care for her! He wanted to
say things, but he seemed to be struck dumb, appalled by what it was
they were about to do. He held her arm close to him. She was going away!
Now that the moment had come he did not know ho