"Don't you think you can trust me?" he answered very quiet.
I looked at him, a long, slow survey, and as I did it my anger simmered down. It's part of my business to read faces and what I saw in his made me say sort of reluctant:
"Well, maybe I can."
He leaned forward and put his hand on mine.
"Miss Rogers, if you'll stand in with me, trust me and let me help, you won't make any mistake. For I'll stand in with you, not now, not just for this thing, but for always. You've my word on it and I don't break my word."
That ended it—not what he said but the look of him while he said it. Almost without knowing it my hand turned under his and they clasped. Solemn as a pair of images we shook. Any one passing would have thought we were crazy, backed into the brushwood, side by side on the front seat, shaking hands as if we'd just been introduced.
I told him the whole story and he never said a word. When I came to Miss Maitland's part in it, I couldn't but look at him. He drew his eyebrows down in a frown and fiddled with his fingers on the wheel. Even when I told him what they thought about her and Chapman Price he didn't made a sound, but he straightened up, and drew a deep breath like he wanted more air in his lungs. I got it some way then—I can't exactly say how—that he was a good deal more of a person than I'd guessed—a lot more iron in his make-up than I'd thought when I liked his laugh and his boyish, jolly ways.
When I finished he said, easy and cool:
"Thank you—that gives me just what I wanted. You won't regret having told me. As for Whitney & Whitney, they won't say anything. They're my lawyers—known 'em all my life. I'll take care of that."
He took hold of the wheel and the car backed out into the road.