"What about Aleck Reese?" he began with fierce abruptness.
The girl met the question with unwonted flippancy. "I've broken my engagement to Aleck Reese," she said coolly. "Broken it all to smash."
But the latent tremor in her voice did not satisfy the man. "Why did you break it?" he insisted. "Isn't Aleck Reese the man you want?"
Her eyes wavered and fell, and then rallied suddenly to Drew's utmost question.
"Yes, Drew," she answered ingenuously, "Aleck Reese is the man I want, but he's not the kind of man I want!" As the telltale sentence left her lips, every atom of strength wilted out of her, and she sank back into her chair all sick and faint and shuddery.
The impulsive, bitter laugh died dumb on Drew's lips. Instantly he was at her side, gentle, patient, compassionate, the man whom she knew so well. "Do you mean," he stammered in a startled sort of way, "do you mean that—love or no love—I, I am the kind of man that you do want?"
Her hand stole shyly into his and she nodded her head. But her eyes were turned away from him.
For the fraction of a second he wondered just what the future would hold for him and her if he should snatch the situation into his arms and crush her sorrow out against his breast. Then in that second's hesitancy she shook her hair out of her eyes and looked up at him like a sick, wistful child.
"Oh, Drew," she pleaded, "you've never, never failed me yet—all my hard lessons, all my Fourth-of-July accidents, all my broken sleds and lost skates. Couldn't you help me now we're grown up? I'm so unhappy."
The grimness came back to Drew's face.