Page:Randall Parrish--My Lady of the South.djvu/332

MY LADY OF THE SOUTH fingers yet clasping the man's nerveless hand. She may have prayed in the silence—I do not know. There was no movement, no sound, Daniels staring at the bowed head like one in a dream. Then she lifted her face, and looked at him.

"I am glad you came," she said simply, her voice trembling slightly. "I—I have wanted to talk with you alone, for three years—ever since I began to be a woman. But I have been afraid of you; ever since I was a child I have been taught that, and it is hard to break away." Her lips smiled. "But I am not afraid any more; I don't believe you are a bad man; you love your wife and children, you are only like the rest of us—like Colonel Donald, like Judge Dunn—you were born into this feud, and have fought and hated because you knew nothing else. Is n't that so?"

"I—I suppose it is, Miss," the acknowledgment barely audible even in that silence. "I never remember back ter whar I felt diff'rent."

"I cannot blame you, yet it is an awful thing for neighbors to be hereditary enemies, to hunt and kill one another. It seemed natural enough to me once—before I went North to school, and came into a different environment; but now it is a savage horror. I want you to see this as I do; you have to think of me as a friend; I want you to feel the same toward my friends."

"Who do yer mean, Miss?"

"Those you have fought all your life—Jem Donald—"

"Not in a thousan' years!" he interrupted hotly, [ 314 ]