“Yes, ma'am. I think so.” He now sat down again.
“And you let them think that—that Mr. McLean—You dare not look me in the face and say that Mr. McLean did that last night!”
“I reckon I dassent.”
“There! I knew it! I said so from the first!”
“And me a stranger to you!” he murmured.
It was his second broadside. It left her badly crippled. She was silent.
“Who did yu' mention it to, ma'am?”
She hoped she had him. “Why, are you afraid?” And she laughed lightly.
“I told 'em myself. And their astonishment seemed so genu-wine I'd just hate to think they had fooled me that thorough when they knowed it all along from you seeing me.”
“I did not see you. I knew it must—of course I did not tell any one. When I said I said so from the first, I meant—you can understand perfectly what I meant.”