“The flag, the flag!” whispered Crailey, following it with his eyes. “It shows that you helped make it, Fanchon, it's so beautiful. Ah, Tom, they've said we abused it, sometimes—it was only that we loved it so well we didn't like to see anyone make it look silly or mean. But, after all, no man can do that—no, nor no group of men, nor party!” His voice grew louder as the last strains of the music came more faintly from the street. “They'll take your banner across the Rio Grande, Fanchon, but that is not all—some day its stars must spread over the world! Don't you all see that they will?”
After a little while, he closed his eyes with a sigh; the doctor bent over him quickly, and Miss Betty started forward unconsciously and cried out.
But the bright eyes opened again and fixed themselves upon her with all their old, gay inscrutability.
“Not yet,” said Crailey. “Miss Carewe, may I tell you that I am sorry I could not have known you sooner? Perhaps you might have liked me for Fanchon's sake—I know you care for her.”
“I do—I do!” she faltered. “I love her, and—ah!—I do like you, Mr. Gray, for I know you, though I never—met you until—last night. God bless you—God bless you!”
She wavered a moment, like a lily in the wind, and put out a hand blindly. “Not you!” she said sharply, as Tom Vanrevel started toward her. Mrs. Tanberry came quickly and put an arm about her, and together they went out of the room.
“You must be good to her, Tom,” said Crailey then, in a very low voice.
“I!” answered Tom, gently. “There was never a chance of that, lad.”
“Listen,” whispered Crailey. “Lean down—no—closer.” He cast a quick glance at Fanchon, kneeling at the other side of the bed, her golden head on the white coverlet, her outstretched hand clutching his; and he spoke so close to Tom's ear and in so low a tone that only Tom could hear. “She never cared for me. She felt that she ought to—but that was only because I masqueraded in your history. She wanted to tell me before I went away that there was no chance for me. She was telling me that, when he called from the window. It was at the dance, the night before, that she knew. I think there has been someone else from the first—God send it's you! Did you speak to her that night or she to you?”
“Ah, no,” said Tom Vanrevel. “All the others.”