"Evelyn—Evelyn," he pleaded with sudden vehemence, "for Heaven's sake have a little consideration for facts—if you have none for me. I grudge you nothing—I have never done so—and you know it. But—if you really find Frontier life intolerable, I can only give you free leave to go home, directly I scrape together the money for your passage."
"Go home——?" she echoed in blank bewilderment. "What do you mean?"
"What I say."
"But—wouldn't you come too?"
"No. I have no leave due now; and if I had, I couldn't afford to take it."
"You want me to go?" she flashed out in a tremor of apprehension. "I'm only a hindrance to you here. That's the real truth, I suppose?"
"I never said that, and I have given you no grounds for thinking it."
"But do you, Theo—do you?"
Her eyes searched his face for confirmation of her suspicion, and found none.