“The right man,” repeated Johnson, dismally, for his conscience was beginning to smite him hard.
“Don’t laugh!”
“I’m not laughing,” as indeed he was not.
“O’ course every girl kind o’ looks ahead,” went on the Girl in explanation.
“Yes, I suppose,” he observed seriously.
“An’ figgers about bein’—well, Oh, you know—about bein’ settled. An’ when the right man comes, why, she knows ’im, you bet! Jest as we both knowed each other standin’ on the road to Monterey. I said that day, he’s good, he’s gran’ an’ he can have me.”
“I could have you,” murmured Johnson, meditatively.
The Girl nodded eagerly.
There was a long silence in which Johnson was trying to make up his mind to tear himself away from her,—the one woman whom he loved in the world,—for it had been slowly borne in upon him that he was not a fit mate for this pure young girl. Nor was his unhappiness lessened when he recalled how she had struggled against yielding to him. At last, difficult though it was, he took his courage in both hands, and said:
“Girl, I have looked into your heart and my own and now I realise what this means for us both—for you, Girl—and knowing that, it seems hard to say good-bye as I should, must and will....”