“But it clears the man. Isn’t it my duty to show it to Agatha?”
“Well,” said Hastings reflectively, “I’m not sure that it is your duty to put ideas into her mind when you can’t be quite certain that she has entertained them.”
“I should be greatly astonished if she hadn’t,” answered Mrs. Hastings.
Hastings made an expressive gesture. “Oh,” he remarked, “you’ll no doubt do what you think wisest. When you come to me for advice you have usually made up your mind, and you merely expect me to tell you that you’re right.”
Mrs. Hastings thought over the matter for another hour or two. For one thing, Agatha’s quiet manner puzzled her, and she did not know that the girl had passed a night in agony of anger and humiliation, and had then become conscious of a relief of which she was ashamed. There was, however, no doubt that while Agatha blamed herself in some degree for what had happened, she did feel as if a weight had been lifted from her heart. She was sitting alone in a shadowy room watching the light die off the snowy prairie outside, when Mrs. Hastings came softly in and sat down beside her.
“My dear,” said Mrs. Hastings, “it’s rather difficult to speak of, but that little scene at the station must have hurt you.”
Agatha looked at her quietly and searchingly, but there was only sympathy in her face, and she leaned forward impulsively.
“Oh!” she exclaimed, “it hurt me horribly, because I feel it was my fault. I was the cause of it!”
“How could that be?”
“If I had only been kinder to Gregory he would, perhaps, never have thought of that girl. I must have made it clear that he jarred upon me. I drove him”—Agatha turned her face away, while her voice trembled—“into that woman’s arms. No doubt she was ready to make the most of the opportunity.”