ALLIE MAYO: (_to herself._) If I could say that, I can say more. (_looking at woman she has arrested, but speaking more to herself_) That boy in there--his face--uncovered something--(_her open hand on her chest. But she waits, as if she cannot go on; when she speaks it is in labored way--slow, monotonous, as if snowed in by silent years_) For twenty years, I did what you are doing. And I can tell you--it's not the way. (_her voice has fallen to a whisper; she stops, looking ahead at something remote and veiled_) We had been married--two years. (_a start, as of sudden pain. Says it again, as if to make herself say it_) Married--two years. He had a chance to go north on a whaler. Times hard. He had to go. A year and a half--it was to be. A year and a half. Two years we'd been married. (_She sits silent, moving a little back and forth._) The day he went away. (_not spoken, but breathed from pain_) The days after he was gone. I heard at first. Last letter said farther north--not another chance to write till on the way home. (_a wait_) Six months. Another, I did not hear. (_long wait_) Nobody ever heard. (_after it seems she is held there, and will not go on_) I used to talk as much as any girl in Provincetown. Jim used to tease me about my talking. But they'd come in to talk to me. They'd say--'You may hear _yet._' They'd talk about what must have happened. And one day a woman who'd been my friend all my life said--'Suppose he was to walk _in!_' I got up and drove her from my kitchen--and from that time till this I've not said a word I didn't have to say. (_she has become almost wild in telling this. That passes. In a whisper_) The ice that caught Jim--caught me. (_a moment as if held in ice. Comes from it. To_ MRS PATRICK _simply_) It's not the way. (_a sudden change_) You're not the only woman in the world whose husband is dead! MRS PATRICK: (_with a cry of the hurt_) Dead? My husband's not _dead_. ALLIE MAYO: He's _not?_ (_slowly understands_) Oh. (_The woman in the door is crying. Suddenly picks up her coat which has fallen to the floor and steps outside._) ALLIE MAYO: (_almost failing to do it_) Wait. MRS PATRICK: Wait? Don't you think you've said enough? They told me you didn't say an unnecessary word! ALLIE MAYO: I don't. MRS PATRICK: And you can see, I should think, that you've bungled into things you know nothing about! (_As she speaks, and crying under her breath, she pushes the sand by the door down on the half buried grass--though not as if knowing what she is doing._) ALLIE MAYO: (_slowly_) When you keep still for twenty years you know--things you didn't know you knew. I know why you're doing that. (_she looks up at her, startled_) Don't bury the only thing that will grow. Let it grow. (_The woman outside still crying under her breath turns abruptly and starts toward the line where dunes and woods meet._)