"I suppose so," he said presently. "But who's happy? I should like to
know. Cuckoo isn't. Are you, Cuckoo?"
It seemed a cruel question, addressed to that spectre of girlhood.
"I dunno," she answered swiftly. "It don't matter much either way."
"She may be," the doctor said. "And you were happy, Julian."
The tea had certainly cleared the boy's brain. His manner was more
sensible, and the heavy sensuality had gone from his eyes. Though he
still looked haggard and wretched, he was no longer the mere wreck of
vice he had seemed when he drifted into the little room out of the fog.
"Was I?" he said slowly. "It seems a devil of a time ago."
The doctor's heart warmed to these two young creatures, children to
him, yet who had seen so much, gone so far down into the depths that
lie beneath the feet of life. He thought in that moment that he could
willingly give up all his own peace of mind, success, fame, restfulness
of heart, to set them straight up, face to face with strength and purity
once more. One was well born, educated, still handsome, the other a
so-called lost woman, and originally only a very poor and hopelessly
ignorant girl. Yet their community of misery and sorrow put them side
by side, like two children who gather violets in a lane together, or
drown together in some strong, sad river.
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