"Bessy, can you understand that it is hard for a soldier to talk of what has happened to him?"
"I'll say I can," she replied.
"You're sorry for me?" he went on, gently.
"Sorry!... Give me a chance to prove what I am, Daren Lane."
"Very well, then. I will. We'll make a fifty-fifty bargain. Do you regard a promise sacred?"
"I think I do. Some of the girls quarrel with me because I get sore, and swear they're not square, as I try to be. I hate a liar and a quitter."
"Come then—shake hands on our bargain."
She seemed thrilled, excited. The clasp of her little hand showed force of character. She looked wonderingly up at him. Her appeal then was one of exquisite youth and beauty. Something of the baffling suggestion of an amorous expectation and response left her. This child would give what she received.
"First, then, it's for me to know a lot about you," went on Lane. "Will you tell me?"
"Sure. I'd trust you with anything," she replied, impulsively.