"And all day I have to fight against the risk, the peril of discovery.
To feel the women's eyes on me when he comes near, to feel that their
ears are strained to catch the note in my voice which will give me
away, place me under their scorn--and to know that, try as I will, my
voice, my eyes will grow tender as they rest on him, as I speak to him!
To have to hide, to conceal, to crush down my heart while it is aching,
throbbing with the torture of my love for him!"
He strode from her, then came back. The sight of the storm within her
had moved him: for, after all, this strange girl was his daughter,
flesh of his flesh, bone of his bone. He swore under his breath and
struggled for speech.
"And--and the man Stafford?" he said. "He--he has not said--D--n it!
you don't mean to tell me that he is absolutely indifferent, that
he--he doesn't care?"
"I'll tell you the truth," she said. "I swore to myself that I would.
There is too much at stake for me to conceal anything. He
does--not--care for me."
Ralph Falconer uttered a sharp snarl of shame and resentment.
"He doesn't? and yet you--you want to marry him!"
She made a gesture with her hands which was more eloquent than words.
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