"What?"
"I mean," she said, rousing herself from her abstraction, "that it does not matter one way or the other. I am going away to-morrow, Mr. Dexter. I see now that I ought never to have come. But—how could I know?"
"Why do you go?" said her companion, pausing a moment also, in his own train of thought.
"I have duties elsewhere," she began; then stopped. "But that is not the real reason," she added.
"You are unhappy, Miss Douglas; I can always read your face. I will not obtrude questions now, although most desirous to lift the burdens which are resting upon you. For I have something to ask you. Will you listen to me for a few moments?"
"Oh yes," said Anne, falling back into apathy, her eyes still on the point of her slipper.
"It is considered egotistical to talk of one's self," began Dexter, after a short silence; "but, under the circumstances, I trust I may be pardoned." He took an easier attitude, and folded his arms. "I was born in New Hampshire." (Here Anne tried to pay attention; from this beginning, she felt that she must attend. But she only succeeded in repeating, vaguely, the word "New Hampshire?" as though she had reasons for thinking it might be Maine.)
"Yes, New Hampshire. My father was a farmer there; but when I was five years old he died, and my mother died during the following year. A rich relative, a cousin, living in Illinois, befriended me, homeless as I was, and gave me that best gift in America, a good education. I went through college, and then—found myself penniless. My cousin had died without a will, and others had inherited his estate. Since then, Miss Douglas, I have led a life of effort, hard, hard work, and bitter fluctuations. I have taught school; I have dug in the mines; I have driven a stage; I have been lost in the desert, and have lived for days upon moss and berries. Once I had a hundred thousand dollars—the result of intensest labor and vigilance through ten long years—and I lost it in an hour. Then for three days, shovel in hand, I worked on an embankment. I tell you all this plainly, so that if it, or any part of it, ever comes up, you will not feel that you have been deceived. The leading power of my whole life has been action; whether for good or for ill—action. I am now thirty-eight years old, and I think I may say that I—am no worse than other men. The struggle is now over; I am rich. I will even tell you the amount of my fortune—"
"Oh no," said Anne, hurriedly.
"I prefer to do so," replied Dexter, with a formal gesture. "I wish you to understand clearly the whole position, both as regards myself and all my affairs."