"Tell me."
"Like you! The discovery was a shock. It nearly bowled me over. But it's the truth!"
"What do you mean?" she asked, plainly puzzled. "How in the world is Brayley like me?"
"Aside from externals, from refinement, from polish, from all that sort of thing"—he spoke swiftly—"his nature is much like yours. There is the same frankness, the same sincerity, the same heartiness. There is the same sort of generosity, the same bigness of—of soul." He broke off abruptly, surprised to find himself talking this way to her. "You must think I'm a fool," he blurted out, after a second. "I talk like one. You have a right to feel offended—to liken Brayley to you—"
"Since I believe you mean what you say—since I think I understand what you mean—I am not offended! I am proud! Yes, proud if I can be like Brayley in some things, some things which count! If you do nothing beyond making a friend of that man your exile in this Western country of ours will have been worth while. But you will do something more. I did not ask you to come to me just to hear what you had to say about your trouble with Brayley. He told me before you came—told me that you had licked him, as you both put it, and that it served him right! That is your business and Brayley's, and I should keep out of it. But there was something else—I wonder if you think me meddlesome, Mr. Conniston? If I am meddlesome?"
"If we are going to be friends, you and I—and you promised that you would let me make you my friend—hadn't we better drop that word?"
"Then I am going to tell you something. You are to go to work in the Valley. Brayley told you that? Do you guess why—have you an idea—why father is sending you over there?"
"I supposed because he is pushing the work—because he needs all the men there he can get, can spare from the Half Moon."
"I am going to tell you. And I am afraid that father would not like it, did he know. But I know that I am right. I may not see you again before you go—I am going into Crawfordsville in the morning for a few days. What I tell you, you will remember, is in strict confidence—between friends?"
"In strict confidence," he repeated, seriously. "Between friends."