The girl raised her tear-stained face. She had been crushed; and another lesson in the cruelty of the human mind––that human mind which has changed not in a thousand years––had been read to her. But again she smiled bravely, as she wiped her eyes.
“It’s all right now,” she murmured. “It was all right all the time––and I was protected.”
Then she turned to him. “Some day,” she said gently, and in a voice that trembled just a little, “you will help the people of Avon, but not because I shall marry you. God does not work that way. I have loved you. And I love them. And nothing can kill that love. God will open the way.”
“Then you refuse my offer, do you?” he asked sharply, as his face set. “Remember, all the blame will be upon you. I have shown you a way out.”
She looked up at him. She saw now with a clairvoyance which separated him from the mask which he had worn. Her glance penetrated until it found his soul.
“You have shown me the depths of the carnal mind,” she slowly replied. “The responsibility is not with me, but with––God. I––I came to-day to––to help you. But now I must leave you––with Him.”
“Humph!”
He stooped and took up her muff which lay upon the floor. As he did so, a letter fell out. He seized it and glanced at the superscription.
“Cartagena! To Josè de Rincón! Another little billet-doux to your priestly lover, eh?”
She looked down at the letter which he held. “It is money,” 200 she said, though her thought seemed far away. “Money that I am sending to a little newsboy who bears his name.”