She came, heavily coated and veiled, at a quarter after ten that
night, and I took her back to the dining-room, where he was waiting.
He did not make a move toward her, but stood there with his very lips
white, looking at her. And, at first, she did not make a move either,
but stood and gazed at him, thin and white, a wreck of himself. Then:
"Ell!" she cried, and ran around the table to him, as he held out his
arms.
The school-teacher was out. I went into the parlor bedroom and sat in
the cozy corner in the dark. I had done a wrong thing, and I was glad
of it. And sitting there in the darkness, I went over my own life
again. After all, it had been my own life; I had lived it; no one else
had shaped it for me. And if it was cheerless and colorless now, it
had had its big moments. Life is measured by big moments.
If I let the two children in the dining-room have fifteen big moments,
instead of five, who can blame me?
CHAPTER XIV
The next day was the sensational one of the trial. We went through
every phase of conviction: Jennie Brice was living.
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