I had preserved an unmoved countenance and disarmed some apparent suspicions that I had aroused in him and he sank back, with a sigh, and returned to his grievance against Dave.
“They don’t let him talk to me because it agitates me, they say—as if it didn’t hurt me more to worry and worry about things. And you know how Dave keeps things to himself. He takes advantage—I’m afraid he takes advantage of the fuss they make to keep something from me that he doesn’t want me to know. I’m afraid something has happened to—to something that I’m very fond of. Dave ought to go and see, and he doesn’t. It’s very cruel of Dave when I’m this way and can’t do anything about it myself.”
“I think Dave does all he can for you,” I replied, and it was not easy to keep my indignation out of my voice. “He is not in a very easy place himself. Of course, it is not strange that he is not in an easy place; but he brought it upon himself and you are not responsible for your illness. ‘The way of the transgressor is hard,’ but at the same time——”
“Dave a transgressor? Pooh!” he said, and then a sudden flush overspread his pale face. “You—you mean about his being expelled? I—I’d be ashamed to be his own sister and not know Dave any better than you do!” He raised himself on one elbow and regarded me steadfastly, his eyes dark with scorn. “But you’re not his own sister, are you? I wonder if Estelle knows any better. Such a silly lot as girls are, always ready to believe the worst of a fellow!”
“If Estelle knows any better than what?” I asked shrewdly.
“Oh, now you’re pumping me, aren’t you?” he flashed out. “A pretty way to treat a fellow who’s as ill as I am—to come here and pretend to be so beautifully sympathetic just to get something out of me!”
I had learned, at least, that there was something to find out, and my heart thrilled with hope that Dave had after all never done those dreadful things of which he was accused. I leaned over Rob, and took one of his boyish, wasted, sharp-knuckled hands in mine.
“Rob, surely you wouldn’t keep any secret for Dave that was costing him and all who love him so much?” I said earnestly. “If he was wrongfully expelled from college, if he was innocent of the wrong-doing with which he was charged and you knew it, you couldn’t be so wicked, so cruel as to keep silent?”
The color came and went on his sharp-featured, sensitive face and his breathing became stertorous. I was cruel, but I persisted—so much was at stake!
“I don’t know what you come here tormenting me for!” he cried shrilly. “Dave manages his own affairs. Girls make such a fuss about everything. It was no great harm to be expelled from that little six-penny college—the old dolts, they weren’t fit to untie Dave’s shoes, not one of them! Wouldn’t anybody with common sense know that Dave wasn’t the sort of fellow to——”