“And so would you be, if you knew him,” she replied promptly.
“Maybe,” he replied, “and, sure, you’d be the one to convince me. But I’m not hiding the fact that I don’t like to be fighting on the losing side. If it hadn’t been for Hendon we might have pulled through after all.”
“Do you mean you think he gave the information to the Yankees about your plan?” she asked.
“Of course I do,” he replied. “Who else was there?”
“Well, it wasn’t Mr. Hendon,” Dorothea returned positively. “He didn’t know about it. How could he have known if I didn’t tell him? And I didn’t.”
“Faith, that’s the truth,” Tracy admitted with a shake of his head. “I had it so firmly in my mind that he was a traitor that I forgot to put two and two together. Are you sure, though?”
“Of course I can’t be absolutely positive,” Dorothea explained. “But I can assure you he didn’t learn of it from me, and—” she hesitated a moment, “and I have seen a man who did know of it.”
He looked at her a moment closely, then shook his head slowly.
“It’s not for me to doubt what you say or to ask questions,” he began; but she interrupted.
“One thing I should like you to understand,” she said. “I had no hand in it, either directly or indirectly. It was all an accident, my finding out. Please believe that I wouldn’t stay here in this house and abuse its hospitality.”