“Try the other one on and see if it fits,” said David. “I’ve been carrying it about in my pocket for a couple of months. She wouldn’t have it, and I swore I wouldn’t offer it to her again. Take it, and wear it—or sell it; I don’t care what you do with it.”
The girl trembled, her round blue eyes on his face.
“Honest and truly, do you mean it?” she whispered. “I’m almost afraid; it—it’s so—lovely!”
“Put it on,” ordered David, frowning.
He was thinking confusedly of Barbara, of her coldness, her capriciousness, her bad temper, as he chose to term her rather pitiful attempts to curb his own lawlessness. It suddenly appeared to David that he had been abused, made light of, almost insulted, of late. What other construction could be put upon Barbara’s behavior that very afternoon? He still loved her, of course; but her treatment of him certainly merited this tardy reprisal.
“You ain’t had a scrap with her, have you?” Jennie asked timidly, “an’—broke off th’ engagement?”
“Well, not exactly,” he muttered, with a frown.
“Anyway, don’t—show her that ring o’ mine, please. I’m ’fraid—she’d laugh.”
“She won’t see it, ever. Don’t worry about that. And she won’t set eyes on that diamond again in a hurry. Take good care of it, little girl. It’s good for a house and lot—that ring.”
“Is it a real di’mon’?”