She looked up suddenly and caught his gaze; his tone had been hard, but his eyes were tender.
Then it happened!
They had been hiding their deeper feelings under the thin coating of comradeship for a long time. As in the instance of other pent-up explosives, only the right kind of a jar was needed to “trip” the mass.
The threat of a rival—even of such a preposterous rival as Tasper Britt—served as detonator in the case of Frank Vaniman, and the explosion of his emotions produced sympathetic results in the girl across the table from him. He leaped up, strode around to her and put out his arms, and she rushed into the embrace he offered.
But their mutual consolations were denied them—he was obliged to dam back his choking speech and she her blessed tears.
A depositor came stamping in.
They were calm, with their customary check on emotions, when they were free to talk after the man had gone away.
“Vona, I did not mean to speak out to you so soon,” he told her. “Not but what it was in here”—he patted his breast—“and fairly boiling all the time!”
She assured him, with a timid look, that her own emotions had not been different from his.
“But I have respected your obligations,” he went on, with earnest candor. “And this is the first real job I've ever had. It's best to be honest with each other.”