Sally did not answer for a moment, and her face flushed deeply. Then she said unsteadily: "No; for I could not be sure of my motive. Here is my secret. I have loved Jack Emory ever since I can remember. It is impossible for me to assure myself that I would consider interference in their affairs warrantable if I cared nothing for him. I cannot afford to despise myself for tattling out of petty jealousy. But you are responsible for her. You should tell him."
"I will speak to her as soon as we go back. If it is true that they are engaged, and if she refuses to tell him, I shall. But I'd almost rather come out here and drown myself."
"So should I."
"You're a brick, Sally, and I wish to heaven you were going to marry
Jack to-morrow. That would be a really happy marriage."
"So I have thought for years! When he got over his attack of you, I began to hope, although I'd got wrinkles crying about him. I never thought of any other woman in the case." She laughed, with a defiant attempt to recover her old spirits. "And I cannot have the happiness of seeing him one day in bronze, and feeling that he is all mine! For he hasn't even that spark of luck which so often passes for infinitesimal greatness, poor dear!"
"How did you guess that she had the taint in her?" asked Betty, as they were about to land. "She has not a suggestion of it in her face."
"I felt it. So vaguely that I scarcely put it in words to myself until lately. And I never saw such an amount of pink on finger-nails in my life."
VI
Betty went in search of Harriet, and found her in a summer-house
reading an innocuous French romance which her professor had selected.
There was no place near by where Miss Trumbull might lie concealed, and
Betty went to the point at once.
"Harriet," she said, "I am obliged to say something horribly painful—if you want to marry any man you must tell him the truth. It would be a crime not to. The prejudices of—of—Southerners are deep and bitter; and—and—Oh, it is a terrible thing to have to say—but I must—if you had children they might be black."