She came to a stand beside his chair. He wanted to hold out his hand to her as was his custom when she stood near him, but he was afraid that she might not take it.
“Yes, I can promise that,” he said. “I’ll not offer her any more money. I don’t want to see her again, God knows.”
It was an easier promise to make than Rose guessed. The old man, under an air of mild concurrence in her demands, experienced a sensation of cynical amusement at the thought that the first move for a reopening of negotiations must come from Berny.
“Oh, yes, I’ll promise that,” he said amicably. “You needn’t be afraid that I’m going to go on offering her a fortune. The thing’s been done, the woman’s refused it, and there it stands. I’ve no desire to open it again.”
She leaned down to take his hand. He relinquished it to her with an immense lightening of his heart, and peace fell on him as he felt her rub her cheek against his knuckles.
“So you’re not mad at the old man, after all?” he said almost shyly.
“No,” she murmured, “not at him. I was angry at what he was doing.”
It was a subtly feminine way of getting round the delicate points of the situation—that inconsistently feminine way which separates judgment of the individual from judgment of his acts. But it relieved the Bonanza King of the heaviest weight that had lain upon him for many years, and, for once, he gave thanks for the irrationalness of women.
“Well, good-night, honey,” he said, “no matter what crazy notions you’ve got you’re the old man’s girl all right.”
She kissed him.