"I can never understand injustice," he replied. "Still, it was not your fault, and I acted to you like a brute. Besides all that, you were a friend of the Wilsons, and Ned Wilson hates me."
"Why should he hate you?" asked the girl.
"I will not tell you that," replied Paul. "That would be stabbing a man in the back, and I will not be guilty of that. Anyhow, years ago, I incurred Ned Wilson's enmity by telling him certain home truths. He has never forgiven me. But for the stories he set afloat and his action towards me I should have won the last election. All this made me bitter towards you."
"I wonder," she replied, "if you feel so angry towards me, that you should care to make these explanations." And she did not understand at all why she spoke. They were some little distance from the roar of the traffic now, and could hear each other plainly.
"I want you to think well of me," he said.
"Why should you?" she asked.
"I cannot tell you now," replied Paul. "But some day I should like to. You wish me good luck in this fight, don't you?"
"How can I," she asked, "when I look at things so differently? I think I admire your pluck, and if I were in your place I should be proud of the influence you have over the working-men; but, then, I think your policy is a dangerous one."
"Let me explain that to you," he replied eagerly. "I think you do not understand how the working classes feel, and I, even although my father did not belong to that class, I—well, I have been a working-man. And there is a shadow over my name, too, and over my mother's life. I should like to tell you about that."
"Really, Mr. Stepaside, I have no right to hear."