“Miss Colton, listen to me. You are wrong, all wrong, I tell you. There is no plan or plot to make you feel uncomfortable. We are plain village people here, and you are wealthy and have been used to associating with those of your class. Every one in Denboro knew that when you came, and they have been shy of intruding where they might not be welcome. Then there was that matter of the Lane here.”
“Oh, that precious Lane! I wish I had never seen it.”
“I have wished that a number of times in the past few months. But it is here and the question overshadows everything else in the village just now. It does not seem of much importance to you, perhaps; perhaps it is not so very important to me; but—”
Again she interrupted me.
“I think it is important enough to make you forget—ordinary courtesy,” she declared. “Yes, courtesy. DON'T look at me like that! You know what I mean. As I told you before, I am not blind. Do credit me with some intelligence. All the way during this cheerful walk of ours you scarcely spoke a word. Did you suppose I did not know what was troubling you? I saw how that Captain Dean looked at you. I saw those people staring from the post-office door. I knew what you were afraid of their saying: that you are altogether too companionable with Father and me; that you intend selling the land to us, after all. That is what you thought they would say and you were afraid—AFRAID of their gossip. Oh, it is humiliating! And, for a time, I really thought you were different from the rest and above such things.”
I began to feel as if I were once more a small boy receiving a lecture from the governess.
“I am not at all afraid of them, Miss Colton,” I protested.
“You are. Why? Your conscience is clear, isn't it? You don't intend selling out to my father?”
“Certainly not.”
“Then why should you care what people like that may think? Oh, you weary me! I admired you for your independence. There are few persons with the courage to face my father as you have done and I admired you for it. I would not have had you sell us the land for ANYTHING.”