When, at breakfast-time
next morning, Jerry came in with the bottle, she guessed that Louis was
washing off the dust of his swift travel before he came to see her. In
the absorption of feeding the child and talking to Mrs. Twist she almost
forgot him; it was nightfall next day before she saw him, and then he
looked haggard and pinched, and she was almost frantic with fear; when
he was away from her she never thought he was drunk; always she thought
he had met with an accident. He told her, between sobs and writhings,
that once again he had failed, but he had been too ashamed to come to
her until he had slept off some of the traces of his failure. Seeing him
buying a baby's bottle at the store the men of the township had chaffed
him into "wetting the baby's head," and he had forgotten his recent
victory, his adoring love, his fierce resolves, and the little hungry
thing waiting to be fed. Once again she felt stunned, incredulous;
later, when she was up again and going about the cottage and Homestead,
she determinedly forgot. His passionate struggles made it impossible to
feel resentment against him, however much he made her suffer. Always she
was sure this particular time was the last time; always she thought
Louis, like Andrew, had been going along the Damascus road and had seen
a great light.
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