"Now you see into one bit of a human heart, don't you?" said he
bitterly. The gray dawn showed his distorted and wounded face,
scarred, blackened, burned, as at length he tried to look at her.
"I did the best I knew. I knew it wasn't right to feel as I did
toward you--to talk as I did--but I couldn't help it, I tell you, I
just couldn't help it! I can't help it now. But I don't think
it's wrong now, even--here. I was starved. When I saw you,--well,
you know the rest. I have got nothing to say. It would be no use
for me to explain. I make no excuses for myself. I have got to
take my medicine. Anyhow, part of it--part of it is wiped out."
"It is wiped out," she repeated simply. "The walls that stood
there--all of them--are gone. It is the act of fate, of God! I
had not known how awful a thing is life. It is all--wiped away by
fire. Those walls--"
"But not my sins, not my selfishness, not the wrong I have done!
Even all that has happened to me, or may happen to me, wouldn't be
punishment enough for that.
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