"Why not take her with you to England?" he asked.
"Impossible!" Jim answered. "We'd both be much happier here. Even here I am a squaw man—that means socially ostracized." A bitter laugh broke from him. "You see, we have social distinctions out here."
"How absurd!"
"Social distinctions usually are," and Jim laid his arm on Petrie's. He was growing tired of the discussion. Petrie felt that Jim wished to dismiss it, so he determined to play his trump card. This sacrifice of a splendid fellow was madness. Years from now, Jim would thank him that he had urged him to abandon this life to which he clung with his mistaken sense of right.
"I think I am justified in violating my instructions," Petrie began. "You were not to know that Lady Kerhill accompanied me to this country."
Jim's hands tightened on Petrie. "Diana here?" Furtively he looked about him, as though fearful of seeing her. "In America?" He waited to be quickly reassured that there was no danger of her coming to the ranch.
"I left them at Fort Duchesne—her ladyship and her cousin, Sir John Applegate. I was to bring you there and give you what was intended to be an agreeable surprise—but—"
"Thank God you did not bring her here."
Jim moved away, with his hands clinched behind him. Petrie followed as he urged. "She will be disappointed, deeply disappointed; she is still a young and beautiful woman."
If there was temptation in the words, Jim did not betray it. Quite simply he said, "She must be."