“I’m not a child, Mr. Pitt; it isn’t necessary to lie to me.”
“What! Lie to you?”
“Please. I understand how you feel about it. I’m a weak, carefully reared and sheltered girl who must be treated as a child, sheltered from everything unpleasant, and lied to about—about the fact that she is in danger, because she has happened to attract a brute; and that your life is in danger because you’re hiding her.”
“But, really——”
“Well, you needn’t keep up the pretense, Mr. Pitt. I’ve known all the time. I’ve known better than you have; the woman can know better, you know, even if she is a girl. I’ve known ever since Captain Brack came toward me last night up there in the cabin. His eyes were like—like he’d dropped a curtain and let me see a lot of uncaged wild beasts baring their teeth to me. I knew then—more than you could; and I know that he won’t give up—ever.”
“As I recall it,” I said when I could speak with a calmness equal to her own, “you laughed at him at just the moment that you saw all this?”
“Of course. We couldn’t let him see we were scared, could we?”
“And in the canoe, you sang——”
“That was partly for George’s sake. And then I did feel safe; and have felt so ever since.”
“And all your high spirits—playing Injun—fixing up the cave, and so on, have all been acting?”