“You don't understand these people, Jeff. I do. Even if she wanted to stand by me she couldn't. They wouldn't let her. Right now I'm carrying all the handicap I can.”
Jeff walked to the window and stood looking out with his hands in his pockets. The hum of the busy street rose to his ears, but he did not hear it. Nor did he see the motor cars whizzing past, the drays lumbering along, the thronged sidewalks of Powers Avenue. A door that had for years been ajar in his heart had swung to with a crash. The incredible folly of his dream was laid bare to him. Despised, distrusted and disgraced, there was no chance that he might be even a friend to her. She moved in another world, one he could not reach if he would and would not if he could. All that he believed in she had been brought up to disregard. Much that was dear to her he must hammer down so long as there was life in him.
But James—he had fought his way up to her. Why shouldn't he have his chance? Better—far better James than Ned Merrill. He had heard the echoes of a disgraceful story about that young man in his college days, the story of how he had trampled down a working girl for his pleasure. James was clean and honorable... and she loved him. Jeff's mind fastened on that last as a thing assured. Had he not seen her with starry eyes fixed on her hero, held fast as a limed bird? She too was entitled to her chance, and there was a way he could give it to her.
He turned back to James, who was sitting despondently at the managing editor's desk, jabbing at the blotting sheet with a pencil.
Jeff touched the Advocate he still held in his hand. “Did you read this story carefully?”
“No. I just ran my eye down it. Why?”
“Whoever dug it up has made a mistake. He has jumped to the conclusion that I'm Uncle Robert's son. Why not let it go at that?”
His cousin looked up with a flash of eager hope. “You mean—”
“I might as well be hanged for a sheep as a lamb. Let it go the way they have it.”
The lawyer's heart leaped, but he could not let this go without a protest. “No, I—I couldn't do that. It's awfully good of you, Jeff.”