Katharine had not believed that it would hurt her as it did, nor Ralston that love could seem so far away. They turned from each other and talked with their neighbours. John almost thought that Katharine once or twice gathered her black skirts nearer to her, as though to keep them from a sort of contamination. He was on her left, and he was conscious that in pretending to eat he used his right arm very cautiously because he did not wish even to run the risk of touching hers by accident.
Now, in the course of events, it happened that the subject of yachts travelled from neighbour to neighbour, as subjects sometimes do at big dinners, until, having been started by Teddy Van De Water and Fanny Trehearne, it came up the table to Frank Miner. He immediately saw his chance, and plunged into his subject.
“Oh, I don’t take any interest in yacht races, compared with prize fights, since Jack Ralston has gone into the ring!” he said, and his high, clear voice made the words ring down the table with the cheery, laughing cadence after them.
“What’s that about me, Frank?” asked John, speaking over Katharine’s head as she bent away from him towards Russell Vanbrugh, who was next to her on the other side.
“Oh, nothing—talking about your round with Tom Shelton. Tell us all about it, Jack. Don’t be modest. You’re the only man here who’s ever stood up to a champion prize-fighter without the gloves on, and it seems you hit him, too. You needn’t be ashamed of it.”
“I’m not in the least ashamed of it,” answered Ralston, unbending a little.
He spoke in a dead silence, and all eyes were turned upon him. But he said nothing more. Even the butler and the footmen, every one of whom had read both the morning and the evening papers, paused and held their breath, and looked at John with admiration.
“Go ahead, Ralston!” cried Teddy Van De Water, from his end. “Some of us haven’t heard the story, though everybody saw those horrid things in the papers this morning. It was too bad!”
Katharine had attempted to continue her conversation with Russell Vanbrugh, but it had proved impossible. Moreover, she was herself almost breathless with surprise at the sudden appeal to Ralston himself, when she had been taking it for granted that every one present, including his hosts, despised him, and secretly wished that he had not come.
Van De Water had spoken from the end of the table. Frank Miner responded again from the other, looking hard at Katharine’s blank face, as he addressed John.