Grahame looked at him in wonder, and Brott faced him sturdily.
“It seems like treason to you, Grahame!” he said. “So it does to me now. I want nothing in the future to come between us,” he continued more slowly, “and I should like if I can to expunge the memory of this interview. And so I am going to tell you the truth.” Grahame held out his hand.
“Don’t!” he said. “I can forget without.”
Brott shook his head.
“No,” he said. “You had better understand everything. The halfpenny press told the truth. Yet only half the truth. I have been to all these places, wasted my time, wasted their time, from a purely selfish reason—to be near the only woman I have ever cared for, the woman, Grahame!”
“I knew it,” Grahame murmured. “I fought against the belief, I thought that I had stifled it. But I knew it all the time.”
“If I have seemed lukewarm sometimes of late,” Brott said, “there is the cause. She is an aristocrat, and my politics are hateful to her. She has told me so seriously, playfully, angrily. She has let me feel it in a hundred ways. She has drawn me into discussions and shown the utmost horror of my views. I have cared for her all my life, and she knows it. And I think, Grahame, that lately she has been trying constantly, persistently, to tone down my opinions. She has let me understand that they are a bar between us. And it is a horrible confession, Grahame, but I believe that I was wavering. This invitation from Letheringham seemed such a wonderful opportunity for compromise.”
“This must never go out of the room,” Grahame said hoarsely. “It would ruin your popularity. They would never trust you again.”
“I shall tell no one else,” Brott said.
“And it is over?” Grahame demanded eagerly.