"I was only reflecting," he assured her, "that every girl thinks that of every man she loves."
"Do you know of anything to disprove it in the present case?"
"Since you ask," he made hesitant reply, "I did hear some unsubstantiated rumours hereabouts that he had proposed and been rejected by a mountain girl—Cyrus Spradling's daughter."
Cyrus Spradling's daughter! At the name, Anne saw again the lank mountaineer of the loose joints and the uncombed hair, who this morning had parted from her mumbling maledictions against Boone.
He had been a mystery then. Now his name falling into the conversation like a shell that has found its range, had the demoralizing force of an explosion. Her belief was no weathervane to veer lightly, but the bruise on her heart was sensitive even to the touch of a breeze, and it was freshly sore.
"Who—ever told you that," she asseverated in slow syllables, "was a liar. I'd gamble my life on it." Then having made her confession of faith in those staunch terms, she illogically demanded, "When was this alleged affair?"
"Just after he finished college, I believe. I can't be quite sure."
"At that time," said Anne Masters, "and before that, and after that, Boone loved me. It was no divided or vacillating love. I'm so sure of him that I'm perfectly willing to stake everything on it. I'm willing, if I'm wrong, even to pay off my mortgage!"
"Since you take that view," said her father, "I'm sorry to have repeated the story. I hadn't regarded it as so damning, myself. Young men sometimes love more than once without forfeiting all human respect. You might ask Boone about it? I don't fancy he'd lie to you."
"I will ask him," she vehemently declared, "and if there's any atom of truth in it—and I know there isn't—I don't care whom I marry or what happens afterwards! As to Uncle Tom, I don't think I can go on another day being his charity child."