“Brace, I am in earnest. Do not joke.”
“Joke? Good Lord! I tell you, Lyn, I am in deadly earnest—deadlier than you know. When a man puts his love three hundred and sixty-five times a year, in fancy, behind his coffee-urn, he gets his bearings.”
“You’ve never grown up, Brace, and I feel as old—as old as both your grandmothers. I do not mean—puppy-love; I mean the love that cuts deep in a man’s soul. Can it cut twice?”
“If it couldn’t, it would be good-bye to the future of the race!” And now Kendall had the world’s weary knowledge in his eyes.
“A woman—cannot understand that, Lyn. She must trust if she loves.”
“Yes.” The universal language of men struck Lynda like a strange tongue. Had she been living all her life, she wondered, like a foreigner—understanding merely by signs? And now that she was close—was confronting a situation that vitally affected her future—must she, like other women, trust, trust?
“But what has all this to do with Con?” Kendall’s voice roused Lynda sharply.
“Why—everything,” she said in her simple, frank way, “he—he is offering me a second love, Brace.”
For a moment Kendall thought his sister was resorting to sarcasm or frivolity. But one look at her unsmiling face and shadow-touched eyes convinced him.
“You hardly are the woman to whom dregs should be offered,” he said slowly, and then, “But Con! Good Lord!”