"That is a lie—and you know it's a lie," Pendleton answered.
"In the light of her past or of yours?" was the sneering question.
Pendleton hesitated what to answer. The man was plainly laboring under intense excitement. His hands were trembling, his face was flushed, he was beating a tatoo on his boot with his crop.
Suddenly Stephanie spoke. She had remained sitting down until now.
"I think it is better that I should continue my walk," she remarked. "You men are not apt to come to an understanding, so let us go our respective ways. Mr. Pendleton, I thank you more than I can say—and I shall be glad to see you at my home any time you choose to call. I shall wait until you both are gone."
"Come, Lorraine!" Pendleton laughed good-naturedly. "We will go together."
On Stephanie's account he was willing to do anything to get him off.
"No—we will not go together," Lorraine replied curtly, ignoring the other's friendly tones and manner. "You'll go first, and I'll follow to see that you don't come back."
His bearing was quite as insulting as his words, but Pendleton did not seem to notice. It was the indulgent man and the complaining boy.
And Stephanie understood and gave Pendleton a quick glance of appreciation. He was trying to save her from further annoyance, she knew, and she loved him for it, but she had endured so much the last two years that she was hardened to a callous indifference. Once she would have been shamed to the earth by Lorraine's accusation; now it made no impression on her—she simply shrugged it aside. Indeed, she found herself studying its revelations as to her husband's character, and pitying him for this exposition of his weakness and vacillation.