"Don't be angry with me. You speak so severely. But I can't tell you how I like to hear you say it."
"It was a bugbear of your own imagination, and I feel angry with you when I think of it. And if you take my advice you will never, never, under any circumstances, let her, or anyone else, know that you thought such a thing."
"I would rather tell her all about it sometime. She would forgive it."
"I dare say she would." Durgan spoke bitterly. "I don't know what forgiveness in such a case is; but no doubt, whatever it is, it would cost her more than you can conceive. She would give it to you; but you are a child if you think that she would ever recover from the wound of such knowledge. God may put such things right in the next life, but never in this. That, at least, is my opinion."
"I am offended with you," she said. She was looking very well that day. Her blue cotton riding-dress and blue sun-bonnet well displayed the warm color and youthful contour of her face. There was a peace in her eyes, too, that he had never seen there before. "I wanted to tell you something else, but you have made me angry."
"Forgive me, then. It is so easy." There was sarcasm in his voice.
She thought for a few minutes, and seemed to forget her quarrel.
"Mr. Alden went to Hilyard, and he has come back without finding out anything about 'Dolphus. I was so much afraid. I have asked Hermie if we might not tell him just about 'Dolphus; but she spoke to me so solemnly, so sadly, that now I only regret that I told you. I want to beg you never to repeat it. I don't understand Hermie's motives, but I can't side against her."
"What has Alden been doing?"
"He has been attending to business letters and papers. He is making this his holiday, but of course he has always a great deal of business on hand. He thinks a great deal over his writing. This morning he spent hours pacing in the pasture and sitting on the stile."