“No,” she said. “It was not good. But I had known you two days then, and I—I thought there must—have been some mistake—until—” she broke off passionately. “Oh, what is the use of all this?” she gasped. “It’s lowering to your pride and to mine. If I have said more than I meant to say, it is because I want you to know why I never want to see you—to hear of you again.”
He bowed his head beneath the storm. He deserved it, he knew, and there was even a bitter pleasure in his retribution, for her indifference had been hardest to bear.
“I understand,” he said quietly. “I will go in a moment. But first I mean that you shall hear what I have to say.”
She remembered that tone of command. He had used it when he had lifted her in his arms and carried her helpless to his camp-fire. The memory of it shamed her, as his presence did now, and she walked on more rapidly. Their path had been deserted, but they were now approaching the Avenue where the hurrying pedestrians and vehicles proclaimed the end of privacy. A deserted bench was before them.
“Please stop here a moment,” he pleaded. “I won’t keep you long.” And when she would have gone on he laid a hand on her arm. “You must!” he insisted passionately. “You’ve got to, Jane. You’ll do me a great wrong if you don’t. I’ve kept the faith with you since then—since I was mad there in the wilderness. You didn’t know or care, but I’ve kept the faith—the good you’ve done—don’t undo it now.”
A passer-by was regarding them curiously and so she sat, for Gallatin’s look compelled her. She did not understand what he meant, and in her heart she knew she could not care whose faith he kept, or why, but she recognized in his voice the note of a deep emotion, and was conscious of its echo in her own spirit. Outwardly she was as disdainful as before, and her silence, while it gave him consent, was anything but encouraging. As he sat down beside her the puppy, “Chicot,” put his head upon Gallatin’s knees and looked up into his eyes, so Gallatin put his hand on the dog’s head and kept it there.
“I want you to know something about my people—about—the Gallatins——”
“I know enough, I think.”
“No—you’re mistaken. We are not all that you think we are. Let me go on,” calmly. “The Gallatins have always stood for truth of speech and honesty of purpose, and whatever their failings they have all been called honorable men. Upon the Bench, at the Bar, in the Executive chair, no word has ever been breathed against their professional integrity or their civic pride. My great grandfather was a Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, my grandfather a Governor of the State of New York, my father——”