“Then don’t quit McLagan’s, boy,” Peter went on earnestly. “Don’t quit Barnriff. Jim, boy, you can’t have her, but you can help her to happiness by standing by. I’m going to stand by, too, for she’s going to need all the help we can both give her.”
“But how can I ‘stand by’ with Will––her husband?”
“You must stand by because he’s her husband.”
“God!”
“Jim, can’t you try to forget things where he’s concerned? Can’t you try to forget that shooting match and its result? Can’t you? Think well. Can’t you, outwardly at least, make things up with him? It’ll help to keep him right, and help toward her happiness. Jim, I ask you to do this for her sake, lad. I know what you don’t know, and I can’t tell you. It’s best I don’t tell you. It would do worse than no good. You say you love her better than life. Well, boy, if Eve’s to be made happy we must help to keep Will right. He’s got a devil in him somewhere, and anything that goes awry with 117 him sets that devil raging. Are you going to help Eve, Jim?”
It was some moments before any answer was forthcoming. It was the old battle going on of the man against himself. All that was human in Jim was tearing him in one direction, while his better side––his love for Eve––was pulling him in the opposite. He hated Will now. He had given way in this direction completely. The man’s final outrage at the saloon had killed his last grain of feeling for him. And now he was called upon to––outwardly, at least––take up his old attitude toward him, a course that would help Will to give the woman he had robbed him of the happiness which he himself was not allowed to bestow. Was ever so outrageous a demand upon a man? He laughed bitterly, and aloud.
“No, no, Peter; it can’t be done. I’m no saint. I’d hate to be a saint. Will can go hang––he can go to the devil! And I say that because I love Eve better than all else in the world.”
“And the first sacrifice for that love you refuse?”
“Yes. I refuse to give my friendship to Will.”
“You love her, yet you will not help her to happiness?”