“Never was more in earnest in my lifetime,” she answered, solemnly.
“Then I will take it, though I feel humbled to the very dust to think of these little hands saving me.”
He bent and kissed them as reverently as though she had been his patron saint. As she gave him the check for one thousand dollars, Cherokee thought his trembling hands told, but too well, of humbled pride.
“That was a stroke of genius—a decided stroke of genius,” he said to himself, as he passed into the club house that day.
CHAPTER III. AN HONEST MAN’S HONEST LOVE.
It was far into twilight when Robert Milburn rang the bell at the Stanhopes. He had called to escort them to the closing ball of the Manhattan season.
“I have not seen you for more than a week, Robert. I fear you have been worrying or working too hard,” said Cherokee, looking at him searchingly and anxiously.
“Ah, not working any more than I should, yet there has been a terrible weight on my mind—a crushing weight.”