“It so happens, now and then,” said he at last, and rather lamely, “that one is forced to contend with such conditions.”
“Forced!” Her eyes flashed scornfully as she caught the word up. “It seems, sir, that you are a trifle disingenuous. Your choice is free in the matter, I should think.”
He snuffed the long wick of the candle with his fingers; in the heightened light he looked at her with attention. And as he looked, his wits slowly returned. He resented the scorn so plain in her dark eyes; his anger grew at the contempt written so straightforwardly in her face.
“Here I am,” was his thought, “and for no other purpose in the world but that she may be kept from danger; and she goes out of her way to treat me as though I were some scurvy rascal.”
Then, aloud, he said:
“That I chose to be abroad upon another night, as you will perhaps recall, served certain people well. Who knows but that another such occasion might now arise; for, unless I am mistaken, the conditions are much alike.”
He heard her breath intaken sharply at this; and when she answered, her voice shook a little.
“I don’t think I quite understand,” she said.
“Do you mean that you don’t understand what happened at that other time, or what may happen to-night?”
“As to that other night,” she said, “I was puzzled at first. But later, I came to understand. I saw that the matter had not gone far enough to serve your purpose, and you desired to learn more than you knew. Then,” and she flashed him a look of contempt, “they might seize upon my brother and welcome.”