“Oh, I feel—so wicked. While all this—was happening—I—I was—getting married!”
“Married?”
“Yes—to Gordon.” She ran on brokenly, giving him in bits the tale of all that had happened since his departure—her abduction, Ramon’s death, Gordon’s ultimatum. “He begged so hard—and the padre and the jefe said—that I ought—and I wanted to, myself—and we were so happy until—we saw the smoke. And now I—I feel like a criminal.”
“Then you needn’t.” He patted her shoulder. “The jefe was right. Never again will you have more need of a man’s strength.”
“But? At this time? While—”
“How were you to know? An’ remember how hard she worked and wished to bring this very thing about. ’Twould have filled her with joy to know that it had come to pass. ’Deed, Missy, she does know an’ is glad at this very moment.” With that mixture of rude faith and humility that made his enormous strength incongruous, he went on: “Sure she knows an’ some day she’ll tell you so herself. ’Twon’t be for me to hear it. My kind don’t go where she is. But you will, an’, mark me, the first thing she’ll tell will be how happy she was in your marriage.”
“Oh, if I thought she would!”
“Be certain of it, child.” The last lights had now gone out on the highest peaks. Looking off and away into the gathering gloom, he recited many a hope that Mary Mills had expressed.
While he talked Lee’s sobs diminished. She looked up when he finished. “That makes me feel better. And you? You, too, think I did right?”
She could see, through the gloom, his sadness lighten. “For what d’you s’pose I brought him here?”