I can't talk about it. I guess I'd better say good-by
now. I'll lose my nerve if I get to thinking and talking. I don't want
to think that I might still get some happiness out of life if--if I
went after it right."
She put her cold hand on his big, clenched fist. He looked at her. The
faint light from a near-by lamppost struck his face. It was heavy,
leaden with despair and misery.
"Almost the last thing she said to me before she went away was this,
Tom: 'Some day I shall go to him. He needs some one to love him. I am
sure he is not so wicked as--' She got no farther than that. I stopped
her."
"She said all--Mary, why did you stop her? Why didn't you want her to
say it? Why did you begrudge me a little thing like that?" He was
trembling violently. There was misery, not anger or resentment in his
voice.
"Tom, are you ready to go to the river?"
He shrank away from her, shuddering, appalled.
"It's hard to die, after all. I--I ought not to have let you tell me
all this. It's made it harder. I never thought of it before. Somehow,
Mary, I--I think I might have turned out a better man if--if I'd known
just how Christine felt.
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