I guess I'd changed a heap myself; anyhow, that was the first thing she spoke about, and the tears came into her eyes as she breathed: "'Poor boy! poor boy! You took it very hard, didn't you ?'" "'You sent for me,' said I.'Which road did he take ?'" "'There's nothing you can do to him,' she answered back.

'I sent for you to make sure that you still love me." "'Did you ever doubt it ?' said I, at which she began to cry, sobbing like a woman who has worn out all emotion.
"'Can you feel the same after what I've made you suffer ?' she said, and I reckon she must have read the answer in my eyes; for I never was much good at talking, and the sight of her, so changed, had taken the speech out of me, leaving nothing but aches and pains and ashes in its place.
When she saw what she wished to know, she told me the story, the whole miserable story, that I'd heard enough of to suspect.

Why she'd married the other man she couldn't explain herself, except that it was a woman's whim--I had stayed away and he had come the oftener--part pique and part the man's dare-devil fascination, I reckon; but a month had shown her how she really stood, and had shown him, too.

Likewise, she saw the sort of man he was and the kind of life he lived.

At last he got rough and cruel to her, trying every way to break her spirit; and even the baby didn't stop him--it made him worse, if anything--till he swore he'd make them both the kind he was, for her goodness seemed to rile and goad him; and, having lived with the kind of woman you have to beat, he tried it on her.