There was some look of heavenly pity In his eyes, as gravely and
sadly they met her upturned gaze, which touched her stony heart.
Still looking at him, as if drawing some good influence from him,
she said low and mournfully, "He has left me, sir!--sir, he has
indeed!--he has gone and left me!"
Before he could speak a word to comfort her, she had burst into
the wildest, dreariest crying ever mortal cried. The settled form
of the event, when put into words, went sharp to her heart; her
moans and sobs wrung his soul; but, as no speech of his could be
heard, if he had been able to decide what best to say, he stood
by her in apparent calmness, while she, wretched, wailed and
uttered her woe. But when she lay worn out, and stupefied into
silence, she heard him say to himself in a low voice--
"Oh, my God! for Christ's sake, pity her!"
Ruth lifted up her eyes, and looked at him with a dim perception
of the meaning of his words. She regarded him fixedly in a dreamy
way, as if they struck some chord in her heart, and she were
listening to its echo; and so it was. His pitiful look, or his
words, reminded her of the childish days when she knelt at her
mother's knee; and she was only conscious of a straining, longing
desire to recall it all.
He let her take her time, partly because he was powerfully
affected himself by all the circumstances, and by the sad pale
face upturned to his; and partly by an instinctive consciousness
that the softest patience was required.
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