Warren was somewhat staggered. "Then I suppose I'm insulting you by thinking you are a darned clever kid, and the rest of them a pack of fools for making a fuss over nothing."
Agatha left him in doubt on this delicate point. The little hope that had stirred in her heart had died almost as soon as it was born, and the resulting anguish seemed out of all proportion to its brief existence. Forbes did not share Warren's leniency toward her summer's masquerade. He was one of the fools who condemned her. She looked away toward the hills and suddenly her face twisted in passionate weeping.
"Don't do that, Hephzibah. For God's sake, don't cry. Can't you let me help you, little girl? You need a friend I'm sure, and there's nothing I'd like better than to help you. You've bewitched me, Hephzibah. I lost my head over you when I thought you were an ignorant little country girl, murdering the king's English every time you opened your mouth. And the more I know of you, the more wonderful you seem. I'm crazy about you."
Agatha's sobs quieted as she listened. When a woman has been humiliated beyond a certain point, nothing can restore her self-esteem like being made love to by a personable man. Warren's irreproachable costume, his good looks, his convincing air of prosperity all helped in her struggle against intolerable mortification. Yet though she dried her eyes at his agitated request, and favored him with a faint, watery smile, she thought of him, if the truth be told, less as a lover than as a life-preserver.
Warren sat upon the porch and smoked while Agatha made herself presentable. It took her some time and he was not sorry, for he wanted a chance to get himself in hand. He had said very much more than he had intended to say when he bought his ticket that morning, and though he did not exactly regret his indiscretion, he told himself that he had better go slow. Twenty-four hours earlier the name Agatha Kent had suggested to him a benevolent old lady with a double chin, the chin an entirely gratuitous contribution of his active imagination. Hephzibah Diggs was a beautiful but deplorably ignorant country girl who had got herself into trouble, like many another ignorant beauty. It was too soon to propose to either. Yet as he glanced impatiently at his watch, Warren realized that the charm of Agatha was her unexpectedness. You never knew what she was going to do. You never could tell what she might make you do, in spite of your better judgment.
Agatha's delay gave him the time he needed. She presented herself in a faded gingham which nevertheless had the advantage of being freshly laundered, her heavy hair wound about her head with a negligence a woman would have interpreted to mean that to Agatha, her caller mattered very little. Now that her face was clean he saw how pale she was, and how dark the circles under her eyes, and this discovery was responsible for an unwonted gentleness in his manner. He talked as a big brother might have talked, and the instinctive, virginal defiance which his unconcealed admiration had always roused in her, changed by imperceptible degrees to confidence.
He asked her bluntly about her finances and she told him without hesitation or evasion. He hinted at monetary assistance and she stopped him midway, with an imperious tilt of her chin and a haughty stare. "You are not talking to Hephzibah Diggs," she reminded him.
Warren sighed and changed his tactics. "Did you ever think of selling your place?"
"I'm afraid nobody would want it, it's so dreadfully old and tumbledown. And besides we've got to have a roof over our heads."
"You couldn't sell it here, of course. But there are possibilities in this place. A small summer hotel ought to do well. Magnificent old trees, fine view, convenient to the city." He studied his surroundings with an appraising eye. "It should bring at least fifteen thousand if you found the right purchaser."