"Then I am going with him."
"Go with him? You, a young girl, go with a man who is in charge of an officer? It's impossible. I pray God it's not true, but if the law can prove that Page has sinned, he will have to pay the penalty in prison. You can't go there."
"No, but I can wait outside, and be ready to stand by him when he is released. No matter how guilty the law declares him, he is still the same Page to me. He's mine. I belong to him. Did not my own mother think home and country well lost for love? She knew her fate and smiled while she blindly followed. I know mine, and there is no other path for me but by the side of Page. Whatever comes I've known his love."
It was not the raving of a hysterical girl; it was the calm utterance of a woman—one of the East, who in recognizing the call of her destiny unshrinkingly accepts its decrees of sorrow as well as of joy. By training, environment and inclination Zura Wingate might be of the West; but her Occidental blood was diluted with that of the East, and wherever is found even one small drop, though it sleep long, in the end it arises and claims its own as surely as death claims life.
It was only a little while since Kobu had left us to go to the station to bring the unwelcome visitor from America.
The hills had scarcely ceased the echo of the shrieking engine, it seemed to me, when I heard the tap of the gong at the entrance. I started at once for Page's room where Zura and Jane were on watch.
Kobu and his companion were ahead of me. The brilliant light of a sunny afternoon softened as it sifted through the paper shoji, suffusing room and occupants in a tender glow. Through it, as I reached the door, I saw Zura half bending over the bed, shielding the face of the sick boy, Jane at the foot with lifted, detaining hand, Kobu's face as he pointed to the bed, saying, "There, sir, is the thief—I mean prisoner," and his startled look as the tall, gray-headed stranger went swiftly to the bed and gathered Page into his outstretched arms.
"A thief!" he cried. "Somebody's going to get hurt in a minute. He's my son. Oh! boy, boy, I thought I'd lost you!"