This girl,
whom Maggie was never to see again hung as a picture in the rooms of
her mind for the rest of her life--the youth, the desperate anxiety
as of one who throws her last piece upon the gaming-table, the
poverty of the shabby black dress, the real physical austerity and
asceticism of the white cheeks and the thin arms and pale hands--
this figure remained a symbol for Maggie. She used to wonder in
after years, when fortune had carried her far enough away from all
this world, what had happened to that girl. But she was never to
know.
There were faces, too, like Miss Pyncheon's, calm, contented,
confident, old women who had found in their religion the panacea of
all their troubles. There were faces like Mrs. Smith's, coarse and
vulgar, out for any sensation that might come along, and ready
instantly to express their contempt if the particular "trick" that
they were expecting failed to come off; other faces, again, like Amy
Warlock's, grimly set upon secret thoughts and purposes of their
own, faces trained to withstand any sudden attack on the emotions,
but eager, too, like the rest for some revelation that was to answer
all questions and satisfy all expectations.
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