“That needs no apology,” she answered, flushing a little. “I cannot be blind to the fact that the terms of my advertisement invited some comment. I was indeed very distracted when I wrote it.”
“You will not, then,” said Gilead, “attribute to mere prying impertinence on my part a desire to ascertain the nature of this persecution, whether to arm myself for your protection against it, or—”
“Or,” she interrupted him, with a faint smile, “to form your own opinion as to the truth of my story?”
“As to our capacity for assisting you,” he corrected her, staidly and courteously.
“Thank you for putting it that way,” she said quietly. “My name is Vera Halifax. Were I to give you the outlines of my history, you would accept the statement as a confidence, I am sure?”
“Most certainly,” he answered.
“I mean a personal confidence,” said the girl.
“If you should desire it.”
“I do desire it, if you please. Ill-chosen as were, no doubt, the terms of my appeal, I never proposed to myself to enlarge upon them save to the sympathy which should seem to justify my trust by its practical sincerity. You will understand me, I am sure, Mr Balm, when I ask you how you propose to deal with my difficulties, if convinced of their reality?”
“Why, how can I answer,” he said, breaking into a smile, “until I know their nature?”