"When he first came in, ye blamed that man for deserting his partner," she said.
Evelyn confessed it and her hostess smiled meaningly.
"Are ye no rather too ready to blame?"
"I'm afraid I am," Evelyn admitted, with the color creeping into her face as she remembered another instance in which she had condemned a man hastily.
"In this case, ye were very foolish. The man came down for help, and if he could no get it, he would go back his lone, if all the way was barred with ice and he must walk on his naked feet. Love of woman's strong and the fear of death is keen, but ye will find now and then a faith between man and man that neither would sever." She paused and looked at the girl fixedly as she asked: "What of him that could inspire it?"
Evelyn did not answer. She had never seen her hostess in this mood, and she also was stirred; but the elder lady went on again:
"The virtue of a gift lies in part, but no altogether, with the giver.
Whiles, it may be bestowed unworthily, but I'm thinking it's no often.
The bond that will drag Carroll back to the North again, to his death, if
need be, has no been spun from nothing."
Evelyn had no doubt that Mrs. Nairn was right. Loyalty, most often, demanded a worthy object to tender service to; it sprang from implicit confidence, mutual respect and strong appreciation. It was not without a reason that Vane had inspired it in his comrade's breast; and this was the man she had condemned. That fact, however, was by comparison a very minor trouble. Vane was lying, helpless and alone, in the snowy wilderness, in peril of his life; and she knew that she loved him. She realized now, when it might be too late, that had he in reality been stained with dishonor, she could have forgiven him. Indeed, it had only been by a painful effort that she had maintained some show of composure since Carroll had brought the disastrous news, and she felt that she could not keep it up much longer.
What she said to Mrs. Nairn she could not remember, but escaping from her she retired to her own room, to lie still and grapple with an agony of fear and contrition.
It was two hours later when she went down and found Carroll, who still looked drowsy, about to go out. His hostess had left him for a moment in the hall, and meeting the girl's eyes, he smiled at her reassuringly.