“What was the use?”
“We could have stopped its getting into the papers, or had it right.”
“Well—it all comes down to a question of luck sometimes,” said Stover. “I was just as responsible as they were—it was only fooling, but there’s the chance.”
“Dink, I’ve done one thing you may not like.”
“What’s that?”
“I’ve written the whole story to your folks at home—sent it off.”
“No—I don’t mind—I—that was rather white of you, Bob—thank you,” said Stover. He drew a long breath, went to the window and controlled himself. “What are Troutman and Schley going to do?”
“They’re all broken up,” said Story.
“Don’t wonder.”
“They won’t face it out very long,” said Regan, without pity.
“Well, it was a pretty hard test,” said Stover, coming back—and by that alone they knew what it had meant to him.
Despite the giving out of the true story, the atmosphere of scandal still clung to the adventure. His friends rallied stanchly to him, but from many quarters Stover felt the attitude of criticism, and that the thing had been too public not to affect the judgment of the senior societies, already none too well disposed toward him.
Stover was sensitively proud, and the thought of how the story had traveled with all its implications wounded him keenly. He had done nothing wrong, nothing for which he had to blush. He had simply acted as a human being, as any decent gentleman would have acted, and yet by a malignant turn of fate he was blackguarded to the outer world, and had given his enemies in college a chance to imply that he had two attitudes—in public and in secret.
The next morning came a note to him from Jean Story, the first he had ever had from her—just a few lines.
“My Dear Friend:
“You are coming in soon to see me, aren’t you? I shall be very much honored.
The note brought a great lump to his throat. He understood what she wished him to understand, her loyalty and her pride in his courage. He read it over and over, and placed it in his pocketbook to carry always—but he did not go at once to see her. He did not want sympathy; he shunned the very thought. Before, in his revolt, he had come against a college tradition, now he was face to face with a social prejudice, and it brought an indignant bitterness.
He called every day at the hospital; out of sheer bravado at first, furious at the public opinion that would have him go his way and ignore a human being alone and suffering, even when his motives were pure.
At the end of a week he was told that the girl wanted to see him. He found her in a cot among a row of other cots. She was not white and drawn as he had expected, but with a certain flush of color in her face, and lazy eyes that eagerly waited his coming. When he had approached, surprised and a little troubled at her prettiness, she looked at him steadily a long moment until he felt almost embarrassed. Then suddenly she took his hand and carried it to her lips, and her eyes overflowed with tears, as an invalid’s do with the strength of any emotion.
The nurse motioned him away, and he went, troubled at what his boyish eyes had seen, and the touch of her lips on his hand.
“By George, she can’t be very bad,” he thought. “Poor little girl; she’s probably never had half a chance. What the devil will become of her?”
He knew nothing of her life—he did not want to know.
When she left the hospital at last he continued to see her, always saying to himself that there was no harm in it, concealing from himself the pleasure it gave him to know himself adored.
She would never tell him where she lived, always giving him a rendezvous on a certain corner, from which they would take a walk for an hour or so. Guessing his desires, she began to change her method of dress, leaving aside the artifices, taking to simple and sober dress, which brought a curious, girlish, counterfeit charm.
“I am doing her good,” he said to himself. “It means something to her to meet someone who treats her with respect—like a human being—poor little girl.”
He did not realize how often he met her, leaving his troubled roommates with a curt excuse, nor how rapidly he consumed the distance to their meeting place. He had talked to her at first seriously of serious things, then gradually, laughing in a boyish way, half tempted, he began to pay her compliments. At first she laughed with a little pleasure, but, as the new attitude continued, he felt her eyes on his face constantly in anxious, wistful scrutiny.
One night she did not keep her appointment. He waited troubled, then furious. He left after an hour’s lingering, irritable and aroused.
The next night as he approached impatiently, half afraid, she was already at the lamppost.
“I waited an hour,” he said directly.
“I’m sorry; I couldn’t come,” she answered troubled, but without volunteering an explanation.
“Why?” he said with a new irritation.
“I couldn’t,” she said, shaking her head.
He felt all at once a new impulse in him—to wound her in some way and make her suffer a little for the disappointment he had had to undergo the night before.
“You did it on purpose,” he said abruptly.
“No, no,” she said frowning.
“You did.” Then suddenly he added: “That’s why you stayed away—to make me jealous.”
“Never.”
“Why, then?”
“I can’t tell you,” she said.
They walked along in silence. Her resistance in withholding the information suddenly made her desirable. He wondered what he might do with her. As they walked still in silence, he put out his hand, and his fingers closed over hers. She did not draw them away. He gave a deep breath and said:
“I would like—”
“What?” she said, looking up as his pressure made her face him.
He put out his arms and took her
