He did not answer this. "It's cold in here. Mother shouldn't have let the fire die down." He walked over to the grate and with his fingers laid some lumps out of the scuttle upon the hot coals. "Keep that shawl around you, Winnie. Hadn't I better call Mother and tell her to help you to get to bed?" He came back to her. She did not speak to him. Tears rolled from her open eyes and left wet smears along her lifted face. "All worn out, eh?" He touched her hair uncomfortably. "I'll call Mother. She always knows what to do for you. I don't." She clung to his hand. "You don't hate me because I'm like this, do you, Laurie?" "Don't be foolish, Winnie, child. You're worn out or you wouldn't talk this way." He put her gently from him. "I'm going to call Mother." She began to sob. "You want to go! I don't want you to touch me if you hate me!" Smiling wearily, he looked at her. It was a kind of relief to him to be unable to defend himself. "Since I make you cry, I think I'd better go, Winnie." "Oh," she sobbed, "you make me cry by not wanting me! You hurt me so. You're so cruel!" Still he stood helpless, not touching her. "For your own sake, you must stop, Winnie." "If--if you call Mamma Farley in here now I'll--I'll kill myself!" "No, you won't, Winnie." His voice shook. "But if you don't want me to call her, I won't." Winnie became a little calmer. Then she said, more soberly, "You neglect and despise me." "I don't, Winnie." "You do!" She sat up quickly. Her eyes insisted on his reply. "Do you believe that? Does my life really indicate that to you?" Her little face was hard. "You do things for me," she contended, "but it's not because you love me!" His smile faltered. He shrugged wearily. "It would be hopeless for me to attempt to justify myself, Winnie, but for the sake of your health and your baby" (he looked at her straightforwardly) "we must try to overcome this continual bickering." She looked steadily with her dissolving gaze against his unpenetrated eyes. "Oh, I wish my children didn't belong to you!" she said suddenly. He glanced away from her. "If I thought you and the children could do without me I might agree to resign my parental rights," he said with a slight sneer. She pressed her hands together, regarding him in silence. Finally she said, "Oh, I know you'd be glad to!" She was crying soundlessly. He does not love me. She felt sorry for herself. She felt the slightness of her body and the fragileness of her bones. She was new and real to herself in her illusion of smallness that made it easier for her to relinquish her pride. She turned her face from him and lay back on the pillow again. Voluptuously, she was conscious of her weakness. With infinite and exquisite contempt, she loved herself. "Laurie?" Her fingers picked the cover. She did not look at them, but she knew them, little and thin, and remembered how small they were when he held them in his clumsiness. "Won't you kiss me, Laurie?"