Scorn of him flashed in her dark eyes. She stood straight and rigid, but in spite of herself she breathed fast.
"You've forgotten your promise. You've lost faith again," he charged.
His impudence stirred contemptuous anger. "I know you now, sir," she told him with fine contempt.
"And you promised to believe in me." He said it quietly, with just a touch of bitterness in the reproach of his wistful voice.
The first hint of startled doubt came into her eyes. It was as if he had breathed into a marble statue the pulse of life. He had known her vivid as a thrush in song, a dainty creature of fire and dew. She stood now poised as it were on the edge of hope.
"How could I believe when I found your guilt on you? What right have you to ask it?"
"So you found the paper in the hat, did you?"
"Yes."
"Certain about my guilt this time, are you?"
He said it almost with a sneer, but nothing could crush the resurgent glow in her heart. Against the perilous and emotional climax which was growing on her she set her will in vain. Why was it that the mere presence of this man called to her so potently and shook her confidence in his guilt?