Understanding the sharp divergence of opinion in the little circle, Hamilton kept a curb upon his tongue save at convenient seasons. But to his eager and convicted spirit this soon became too difficult. One evening, when there were none to hear him but Barbara, Robert, and Glenowen, the torrent of his boyish ardour overflowed. He depicted the momentous changes toward which each fateful hour was hurrying them. He declared it was no more than a matter of days ere all America would be in the throes of a righteous revolution. He prophesied the birth of a great republic, that should establish Liberty in her New World home, and scourge kings, thrones, and tyrannies into the sea. Glenowen had looked at him warningly, but in vain. Barbara, troubled at first, grew suddenly hot and resentful at the thought that Robert should be blind to the splendid dream. She applauded aggressively.
Robert's brows were knit, but he had no emotion save distress.
"I pray you pardon me, dear lady, and you, Mr. Glenowen, if I take my departure at once," said he, at the first pause. "Knowing my sentiments as you both do, fully, you will understand that I could not in honour stay and listen to such doctrines as these of Mr. Hamilton's and not oppose them with all my force."
He bent over Barbara's hand, but she petulantly snatched it away without letting him kiss it. Then, having shaken hands heartily with Glenowen, and bowed stiffly to Hamilton, he withdrew in great trouble of mind, feeling that now, in truth, had come to an end the truce between his honour and his love. He walked the streets half the night, and in the morning, white and dejected, but determined to know the worst at once, he went around to State Street at the earliest moment permissible after breakfast. Barbara received him coldly. But he made haste to face the issue.
"Surely, dearest lady, you see that I had no alternative but to go!" he pleaded. "I could not quarrel with him, seeing that he was your guest. Yet I could not sit and listen to his treason!"
"I think the same treason as he uttered, if treason it be! And utter it, too, when I see fit!" said Barbara.
"That's different!" said Robert, and paused.
It was on Barbara's lips to ask, "How?—Why?" but she refrained, lest she should complicate the discussion.
"That's different," he repeated, "because you are a woman, and because I love you. But indeed, my lady, I intended no discourtesy to Mr. Hamilton. If discourtesy there were, surely it was his. I would not have attacked what he holds sacred. Yet my sentiments are not less well known than his. He knew that I was pledged to the king's side."
Barbara bit her lips hard. This was just what she had taken such pains not to know. Her heart was bitter enough against him for his views themselves; it was still more bitter against him now for forcing her to confess knowledge of those views.