“I want to talk,” he began, swiftly, hoping to put her at her ease.  “Every one here has been good to me and I’ve talked—­oh, for hours and hours.  But the thing in my mind I haven’t spoken of.  I’ve never asked any questions.  That makes my part so strange.  I want to tell why I came out here.  I need some one who will keep my secret, and perhaps help me. . . .  Would you?”

“Yes, if I could,” she replied.

“You see I’ve got to trust you, or one of these other women.  You’re all Mormons.  I don’t mean that’s anything against you.  I believe you’re all good and noble.  But the fact makes—­well, makes a liberty of speech impossible.  What can I do?”

Her silence probably meant that she did not know.  Shefford sensed less strain in her and more excitement.  He believed he was on the right track and did not regret his impulse.  Even had he regretted it he would have gone on, for opposed to caution and intelligence was his driving mystic force.

Then he told her the truth about his boyhood, his ambition to be an artist, his renunciation to his father’s hope, his career as a clergyman, his failure in religion, and the disgrace that had made him a wanderer.

“Oh—­I’m sorry!” she said.  The faint starlight shone on her face, in her eyes, and if he ever saw beauty and soul he saw them then.  She seemed deeply moved.  She had forgotten herself.  She betrayed girlhood then—­all the quick sympathy, the wonder, the sweetness of a heart innocent and untutored.  She looked at him with great, starry, questioning eyes, as if they had just become aware of his presence, as if a man had been strange to her.

“Thank you.  It’s good of you to be sorry,” he said.  “My instinct guided me right.  Perhaps you’ll be my friend.”

“I will be—­if I can,” she said.

“But can you be?”

“I don’t know.  I never had a friend.  I . . .  But, sir, I mustn’t talk of myself. . . .  Oh, I’m afraid I can’t help you.”

How strange the pathos of her voice!  Almost he believed she was in need of help or sympathy or love.  But he could not wholly trust a judgment formed from observation of a class different from hers.

“Maybe you can help me.  Let’s see,” he said.  “I don’t seek to make you talk of yourself.  But—­you’re a human being—­a girl—­almost a woman.  You’re not dumb.  But even a nun can talk.”

“A nun?  What is that?”

“Well—­a nun is a sister of mercy—­a woman consecrated to God—­who has renounced the world.  In some ways you Mormon women here resemble nuns.  It is sacrifice that nails you in this lonely valley. . . .  You see—­how I talk!  One word, one thought brings another, and I speak what perhaps should be unsaid.  And it’s hard, because I feel I could unburden myself to you.”

“Tell me what you want,” she said.

Shefford hesitated, and became aware of the rapid pound of his heart.  More than anything he wanted to be fair to this girl.  He saw that she was warming to his influence.  Her shadowy eyes were fixed upon him.  The starlight, growing brighter, shone on her golden hair and white face.