“Our bonny Jamie,” sighed Lettice. “Ah me, I hope God will spare him. I hope, O I hope—Oh, Rhoda, what if he should be going, never to return.”
“Don’t!” cried Rhoda, in a sharp, quick voice. And then she snatched her hand from Lettice and, covering her face, sobbed in a convulsive, tearless way.
“Rhoda, dear Rhoda,” cried Lettice. “What a wicked girl I am! I did not mean to be cruel to you. I should have had more consideration for your feelings and have kept my fears to myself.” She essayed to rise, but Rhoda motioned her back. “Come here, then, and sit by me that I may know that you forgive me,” she begged, and Rhoda came. Lettice caressed and soothed her so that in a few minutes she had regained her composure.
“You asked about Robert,” she said. “He has gone to Washington and vows he will never return. He left his address, should any one wish to know of his whereabouts.”
“I am glad. I think that is best.”
Rhoda in her turn began to catechize. “Do you love him, Lettice?”
“No, I can say truthfully that I do not. I was beginning to, I think; but now, I am so racked by doubt and mistrust that I have no room for any other feeling. I do not want to love him. This cloud would ever be rising between us. I would grieve to have harm come to him, and yet—”
“You would denounce him to his enemies?”
“If it would serve my country, yes. I could not tell a lie for him.”
“Then you do not love him.”