“I know what you are, Marpasse. They were ready to whip me; I had no pity.” Marpasse set her teeth. “This life, the devil pity you! For me, yes, but you! I have a brazen face, a conscience like leather, and talons that can tear. But you! Bah, you would kill yourself in a month.” She thrust Denise away from her, as though thrusting her from some influence that was dangerous and to be feared. Denise did not resist her, but sat hanging her head, mute and obstinate, her eyes sweeping up now and again to the face of the woman beside her. “I am weary of it all,” she said, “they made the soul sick and bitter in me.” Marpasse sat with her chin on her fists, her forehead one great frown. “Ssh, and you thought of me, and the road! Am I such a damned witch as that!” “You do not curse, and preach.” Marpasse turned on her with sudden, fierce sincerity. “Yes, I do not preach, because I am down in the ditch, but I know what the mud is like, and I do not want you with me. Bah, let me think. What shall I tell you, that you had better be as dead as the black boar there, before you take to the road.” Marpasse hugged her knees with her arms, staring straight before her, and working her teeth against her lower lip. Denise kept silence, hanging her head, and flying in the face of her own bitterness like a bird that dashes itself against a window at night. Marpasse awoke suddenly from her musings, and caught Denise by the hood of her cloak. She twisted her hand into the grey cloth, held Denise at arm’s length, and threw one word straight into her face. Denise’s eyes flashed. She reddened from throat to forehead, while Marpasse watched her as a physician might watch the workings of some violent drug. Presently the brown eyes faltered, and grew clouded with the infinite consciousness of self. Marpasse burst into a loud, harsh laugh. The next moment she had her arms about Denise. “Soft fool, the word stings, eh? You are innocent enough; it is all temper, and anger and discontent. Your conscience answered to the sting. I throw your own word in your face, and you redden like an Agnes. No, no, you are not made to be one of us, thank God!” Denise felt this big woman’s brown arms tightly about her. A great spasm of emotion had gathered in Marpasse’s throat. She held Denise with a straining, inarticulate tenderness, as a mother might hold a child. “Heart of mine,” said she, “God forgive me for throwing that word in your face. It was the slap of a wet cloth on the cheek of one about to faint. Look up, sister, listen to me, by the Holy Blood, I have the truth to tell.” Marpasse was trembling with the passion in her.