"Jack, you have one member of your family who will stand by you whatever comes, as you have stood by me in the past year," Jean Merritt announced. "I have not said a great deal while the rest of the family has been doing so much talking and yet I believe I am glad of your decision. I know one is prejudiced against the idea, not so much of women in politics as of a young woman like you, Jack, who is so beautiful and charming and sincere and one who happens to be so near one's own affections. I suppose disagreeable things will be said of you, yet I know of few women so brave and so straightforward, or better able to bear calumny. And I don't see why people think that marriage always protects a woman from unhappiness; it has not protected me."
Jean rarely spoke of her own sorrow and only in moments of the deepest emotion, so that Olive and Jack both flinched at the close of her little speech, and temporarily at least Jack's problem took second place.
In more than a year, since Ralph Merritt's departure to act as mining engineer in a gold mine in New Mexico, no human being who had ever known him before had laid eyes upon him. In all the time since, no word had arrived of his mysterious disappearance from the mine, and no word had ever been received from him addressed either to Jean or to any one of his family or friends. Utterly and completely he had vanished. Months had been spent by Professor Russell in investigating his whereabouts, every clue had been followed, yet from the moment Ralph was known to have gone into his own tent to lie down until the present, no other news of him had been unearthed.
"I still have faith that things will adjust themselves for you some day, Jean, I don't know exactly why. I appreciate I have no possible evidence to support the idea, but I have always believed and do still believe that Ralph will come back some day and be able to explain the mystery of his disappearance."
Jack gave Jean's hand a tight squeeze.
"Jean, it does help a lot to have you say you will stand by me. I may be brave to-day, but to-morrow I shall probably turn coward. Olive, what about you and Bryan?"
Olive let go her friend's hand and did not answer for a moment. She was always quieter and more reserved in her manner than the other Rainbow ranch girls.
"Bryan and I talked over your possible decision until after midnight, Jack. Bryan argued you would accept, I argued you would not. Bryan seems to have known you best. He says you are made of the right material for what you are to undertake. Yet he dreads it all for you as much as I do, the fatigue, the misunderstanding. It seems impossible to me, Jack, as you must appreciate, and yet you and I are wholly unlike. But I believe you are the most courageous woman I have ever known, just as you were the most courageous girl. One thing Bryan wanted me to say both for him and for me. He believes you will not care for the notoriety, not even for the fame, if it should come to you, but only for the opportunity. And he and I both want you to understand that we will do everything in our power to help you, whatever course you may pursue. You see, dear, Bryan insists I feel toward you like the old axiom, 'My country, right or wrong, but still my country.' However, I told him the old axiom was not only stupid but wrong. One's country must be right, and so must your choice be."
"Hero worship, or rather heroine worship," Jean remonstrated. "Olive had that same absurd attitude toward you as a girl, didn't she, Jack? So small wonder you think you are a sufficiently important person to be nominated for the Congress of the United States! But don't let us keep you any longer from your beloved woods. Jimmie evidently does not know the poem about the small boy: 'Who was never bad, but always good, who never wriggled, but always stood.' So good-by and a happy day."
"You'll tell Jim to come in to speak to me before he goes to bed," Jack called back over her shoulder, as she and Jimmie started off together. "I must send word in the morning what my decision is and so I must see Jim first."