She nodded. “It comes to the same thing. He will drop in once in a while, I suppose. But he has gone back to the Lake with Captain Smiley, and that means that he wants to see--” she turned toward the shadow of the oaks--“there's somebody up in Michigan that--that he--”
“Yes, I have known it a long while.” She turned, looked at him, and spoke impetuously: “Do you think I haven't been fair to him? Do you think he--anybody--could say I hadn't stood all a woman ought to stand?”
Her real emotion caught Beveridge off his guard. For an instant he hesitated; then he said gently: “Don't let it disturb you now, Madge. I don't think he can bother you much more. There is no reason why that shouldn't all slip into the past.”
Beveridge was silent for a moment. He wished to lead her into telling all she knew about McGlory and his ways, yet he hesitated to abuse the confidence so frankly offered. But, however--“There is one thing about it, though, Madge,” he said quietly. “If he is on the Lake, he will have to go where his boat goes, and there isn't much chance for him to get into bad ways. Even if, as you think, he is dishonest, he will have to behave himself until he gets back to town.”
“You don't understand,” she cried. “It is just there, on the water, that he can do the most harm. I'm going to tell you, anyway. I don't care. He is a smuggler, or a moonshiner, or something,--I don't know what you would call it.”
She nodded nervously. “He is only one of them. I have known it for a long time, and sometimes I have thought I ought to speak out, but then he--oh, you don't know what a place he has put me into--what he has dragged me to! There is one thing I will say for Joe,--he is not the worst of them. The rest are smarter than he is, and I believe they have used him for a cat's-paw. But he is bad enough.”
“You don't know how hard this is to believe, Madge. That a man sailing on a decent lumber schooner can manage to do enough moonshining--or even smuggling--to hurt anybody--”
“But that is just it! It is in the lumber.”
“In the lumber!” He had stopped rowing, and was leaning forward. Had her own excitement been less, she could hardly have failed to observe the eager note in his voice.
“Yes--oh, I know about it. But it's no use saying anything. They will never catch the head man--he is too smart for them--” Beveridge took her hand, and held it gently in both his own. “Don't let's think any more about any of them, Madge. I don't wonder it excites you--it would anybody. But you are through with them all now.” She sat up, rigid, and looked at him. “Are you sure I am?”