However, she went on up the Elevated stairs with Maria and Wollaston. Wollaston threw down the fares and got the tickets, and strode on ahead. His mouth was set. He was very pale. He probably realized to a greater extent than any of them what had taken place. It was inconceivable to him that it had taken place, that he himself had been such a fool. He felt like one who has met with some utterly unexplainable and unaccountable accident. He felt as he had done once when, younger, he had stuck his own knife, with which he was whittling, into his eye, to the possible loss of it. It seemed to him as if something had taken place without his volition. He was like a puppet in a show. He looked at Maria, and realized that he hated her. He wondered how he could ever have thought her pretty. He looked at Gladys Mann, and felt murderous. He had a high temper. As the train approached, he whispered in her ear, "Damn you, Gladys Mann, it's a pretty pickle you have got us into." Gladys was used to being sworn at. She was not in the least intimidated. "Do you s'pose I was goin' to have M'ria talked about?" she said. "You can cuss all you want to." They got into the train. Wollaston sat by himself, Gladys and Maria together. Maria was no longer weeping, but she looked terrified beyond measure, and desperate. A horrible imagination of evil was over her. She never glanced at Wollaston. She thought that she wished there would be an accident on the train and he might be killed. She hated him more than he hated her. They were just in time for a boat at Cortlandt Street. When they reached the Jersey City side Wollaston went straight to the information bureau, and then returned to Gladys and Maria, seated on a bench in the waiting-room. "Well, there _is_ a train," he said, curtly. "'Ain't it been took off?" asked Gladys. "No, but we've got to wait an hour and a half." Then he bent down and whispered in Gladys's ear, "I wish to God you'd been dead before you got us into this, Gladys Mann!" "My father said it had been took off," said Gladys. "You sure there is one?" "Of course I'm sure!" "My!" said Gladys. Wollaston went to a distant seat and sat by himself. The two girls waited miserably. Gladys had suffered a relapse. Her degeneracy of wit had again overwhelmed her. She looked at Maria from time to time, then she glanced around at Wollaston, and her expression was almost idiotic. The people who were on the seat with them moved away. Maria turned suddenly to Gladys. "Gladys Mann," said she, "if you ever tell of this--" "Then you ain't goin' to--" said Gladys. "Going to what?" "Live with him?" "Live with him! I hate him enough to wish he was dead. I'll never live with him; and if you tell, Gladys Mann, I'll tell you what I'll do." "What?" asked Gladys, in a horrified whisper. "I'll go and drown myself in Fisher's Pond, that's what I'll do." "I never will tell, honest, M'ria," said Gladys. "You'd better not." "Hope to die, if I do."