“Then we both care! What else matters?”
“Only that I want to give you happiness—and I can’t.”
“You’re the only woman who can.”
“No I’m not, dear. You think so now. But it’s the grease-paint stuff you love! Out on the ranch—with my hair its own color you’d wonder why you did it.”
He paid no attention to her last whispered words.
“I’m willing to risk it! I’ll risk anything for you.”
“You’d find me out, Bill—you’d be bound to. Why, I never go out in the sun without wearing a veil to keep the secret of my complexion to myself. And there, where you belong, I’d be in the sun all day.” She tried to smile. “How would I look going round a ranch like the queen of a harem? No, you’d have to see me as I am. And in a week you’d hate me.”
He went close, hearing only the sob in her voice.
“Dearest—you think I’m young—that I don’t know my own mind. You think I don’t know my woman when I meet her!”
She smiled now, with a little shake of the head.