Part 33 (2/2)

”Are you afraid of me sometimes, really?” he asked.

”Yes, horribly--as much afraid as when we were coming out here to-day.”

”I'm sorry, Elice, sorry for several reasons. Most of all because I love you.”

It was the first word of the kind that had ever pa.s.sed between them. Yet neither showed surprise, nor did either change position. It was as though he had said that gravitation makes the apple fall, or that the earth was round, a thing they had both known for long, had become instinctively adjusted to.

”I knew that,” said the girl gently, ”and know too that you're sorry I am afraid. You can't help it. If it weren't true, though, you wouldn't be you.”

The man looked at her gravely.

”You think it will always be that way?” he asked. ”You'll always be afraid at times, I mean?”

”Yes. You're bigger than I am. I can't understand you, I never can wholly. I've given up hope. We're all afraid of things we can't completely understand.”

Silently the man pa.s.sed his hand across his face, unconsciously; his arm fell lax at his side. As the girl had known, he did not follow the lead, would not follow it unless she directed the way.

”You said you fancied I could forget what's past,” he said at last. ”Did you honestly believe that?”

”Yes, or ignore it.”

”Ignore it--or forget!” The fingers of the great hands twitched. ”Some things one can't ignore or forget, girl. To do so would be superhuman.

You don't understand.”

”No; you've never told me. You've suggested at times, merely suggested; nothing more.”

”You'd like to know why--the reason? It would help you to understand?”

”Yes; I think it would help.”

”It might even lead to making you--unafraid?”

A halt this time, then, ”Yes, it might possibly do even that.”

Again the man looked at her for long in silence, and again very gravely.

”I'll tell you, then,” he said. ”It isn't pleasant for me to tell nor for you to hear; but I'd like you to know why--if you can. They're all back, back, the things I'd like to forget and can't, a very long way. They date from the time I first knew anything.”

The girl settled deeper into the soft coat, her eyes half closed.

”You told me once you couldn't remember your mother even,” she suggested.

”No, nor my father, nor any other relatives, if I ever had any. I was simply stranded in Kansas City when it was new. I wasn't born there, though, but out West on a prairie ranch somewhere. The tradition is that my parents were hand-to-mouth theatrical people, who'd got the free home craze and tried to live out on the west Kansas desert, who were dried out and starved out until they went back on the road; and who then, of course, didn't want me. I don't know. Anyway, when my brain awoke I was there in Kansas City. As a youngster I had a dozen homes--and none. I was any one's property--and no one's. I did anything, accepted whatever Providence offered, to eat. Animals must live and I was no exception. The hand seemingly of every man and woman in the world was against me, and I conformed to the inevitable. Any one weaker than I was my prey, any one stronger my enemy. I learned to fight for my own, to run when it was wisest, to take hard knocks when I couldn't avoid them--and say nothing.

It was all in the game. I know this isn't pleasant to hear,” he digressed.

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