I used to feel sorry for that poor girl, though.

That made me forget to be afraid.

She was such a beauty, in spirit as well as in appearance, and she was only slightly touched; yet she was doomed to lie there, living the life of a primitive savage and rotting slowly away.
Leprosy is far more terrible than you can imagine it." "Poor thing," Ruth murmured softly.

"It's a wonder she let you get away." "How do you mean ?" Martin asked unwittingly.
"Because she must have loved you," Ruth said, still softly.

"Candidly, now, didn't she ?" Martin's sunburn had been bleached by his work in the laundry and by the indoor life he was living, while the hunger and the sickness had made his face even pale; and across this pallor flowed the slow wave of a blush.
He was opening his mouth to speak, but Ruth shut him off.
"Never mind, don't answer; it's not necessary," she laughed.
But it seemed to him there was something metallic in her laughter, and that the light in her eyes was cold.