With sudden impatience she rose, unlacing his arms from about her.
"Who is she?" she cried. "Who is she? Why should she give her life for you? I loved you, and I was afraid. She wasn't afraid."
Dale thought that he began to understand a little better. Jealousy was a feeling he had read about, and seen, and written about. If Jan were jealous, he could undertake to reassure her.
"She's a very old and good friend of mine," he said, "and it was just like her brave, unselfish way to——"
"What had you done to make her love you so?"
"My sweetest Jan, surely you can't think I——"
"Oh, no, no, no! I don't mean that. I'm not so mean as that."
Dale wondered whether this passionate disclaimer of jealousy did not come in part from self-delusion, though he saw that Janet made it in all genuineness.
"You have made her love you—oh, of course you have! Why did she follow you? why did she come between you and the shot? I loved you, too, Dale. Ah! how I loved—how I thought I loved you! But her love was greater than mine."