"Yes!" It was scarcely above a whisper, yet she strove with all her might to make it defiant. She was afraid and yet she fought with herself, seeking to hide her fear from him.
He shrugged elaborately, as though the matter were of no great interest and no longer concerned him.
"Then your blood be on your own head," he said carelessly. "I, for one, will not raise my hand against you; what Taggart does to you concerns only you and Taggart."
"Babe Deveril!"
She called to him with a new voice; she was afraid and no longer strove to hide her fear. Until now she had carried on, head high, in full confidence; confidence in a man. And that man, like Babe Deveril before him, had thought first of gold instead of her. Bruce Standing had spoken of love and had turned aside for gold; with both hands full of the yellow stuff he thought only of more to be had, and not of her.
"Babe Deveril! Listen to me! I have been a fool ... oh, such a fool! I knew so little of the real world and of men, and I thought that I knew it all. My mother had me raised in a convent, thinking thus to protect me against all the hardships she had endured; but she did not take into consideration that her blood and Dick Brooke's blood was my blood! This was all a glorious adventure to me; I thought ... I thought I could do anything; I was not afraid of men, not of you nor of Bruce Standing nor of any man. Now I am afraid ... of Jim Taggart! You helped me to run from him once; help me again. Now. Let me have one of the horses ... let me go...."
All the while he stood looking at her curiously. Toward the end there was a look in his eyes which hinted at a sudden spiritual conflagration within.
"You're not used to this sort of thing?" And when she shook her head vehemently, he added sternly: "And you are not Bruce Standing's? And have never been?"
"No, no!" she cried wildly, drawing back from him. "You don't think that...."
Now he came to her and caught her two hands fiercely.