“You love my sister Jean?” Jonita began again, turning to me with a sharpness in her words like the pricking of a needle’s point.
“Yes!” I answered, but perhaps a little uncertainly.
“Did you know as much when you came into the kitchen?”
“No,” said I.
For indeed I knew not what to answer, never having been thus tangled up with women’s affairs in my life before.
“I thought not,” said Jonita, curtly. Then to Jean, “How did this come about?” she said.
Jean lifted her head, her face being lily-pale and her body swaying a little to me.
“I thought he would go away and that I should never see him again!” she replied, a little pitifully, with the quavering thrill of unshed tears in her voice.
“And you did this knowing—what you know!” said Jonita again, sternly.
“I saw him first,” said Jean, a little obstinately, looking down the while.