"You say that, Margaret, but you don't believe it. Neither do I."
"I think, Millicent, you don't understand our conventionalities down here. It would be impossible for any Virginia girl, under such circumstances, to take the initiative in reopening relations. That is the prerogative of the gentleman in the case."
"But when the gentleman doesn't know the facts, and the woman does, what then?"
"That makes no possible difference."
"You are right on one point, Margaret. I do not understand your conventions, nor do I in the least sympathize with them. They are shams and falsities, as all conventionalities are, and they are cruel beyond measure. They decree that where a mistake has been made and the woman discovers it, she must let wreck and ruin overwhelm two lives—her own and that of the man she loves—rather than send to him a simple and easy explanation of the mistake that has made the trouble. No, I do not understand such conventions. What are you going to do?"
"I'll place the whole thing in my father's hands, and he shall do what he will with it."
"And as to the one who has wrought all this mischief?"
"My relations with my Aunt Betsy will be changed. Come! We must hurry back to the house. I want my father to know what has happened."
They trotted on for a space, when suddenly Millicent reined in her horse and Margaret stopped in company, for Millicent had come to a complete halt in the roadway. For a moment the two confronted each other without a word, for Millicent, sitting on her horse with compressed lips and set jaw, did not at first explain herself. After a while she said:
"I cannot sit idly by and see two glorious young lives wrecked when a next to nothing would save both. I am a Yankee, of Boston, but so was Paul Revere. Let me have those letters. Ask me no questions, but let me ride as Paul Revere did!"