'I'm glad you like it, anyway. You seem to me such a child, Biddy, though you are always telling me you are such an old soul. I can't for the life of me make out what you mean by that.'
'Oh! A soul that has come back and back, and has lived a great many—perhaps naughty—lives.'
'H'm! Yes! Well, one life is good enough for me, and as we can't prove the other thing, what does it matter anyhow? I wouldn't want you in another life if you were going to be quite a different person. I want you as you are in this one. And so I reckon would any man who has ever been in love with you. Let us go back now to what I was asking you. Biddy, there WAS a man—one man that you did care for? You've admitted as much.'
'Yes—I suppose there was.'
'And not so long before you came out here?'
'I suppose that's true too.'
'Bridget!—do you know what's been festering in my mind—the thought that you might be marrying me in a fit of pique—a sort of reaction. Biddy—tell me honestly, my dear, if it's anything of that sort?'
She seemed to be considering.
'I don't quite know how to answer you, Colin—if I'm to be absolutely honest. And I'd always rather tell you the truth.'
'Thank God for that. Let there be truth between us—truth at any cost.'