She did not pause to consider the correctness or the incorrectness of her inference. It was quite enough for her to know that this spirit of inequality existed. In his presence, however, she felt at perfect ease, wholly oblivious of everything save her own happiness, as she could now bear witness to, but alone with her thoughts the horrible imagining forced itself upon her and served to widen perceptibly the gulf between them. Reflection disconcerted her.
Happily, her enterprise respecting Anderson and his nefarious scheme had terminated successfully. Happily, too, Stephen's misconstruction of the affair had been corrected. No longer would he doubt her. Their fortunes had approached the crisis. It came. Anderson had fled town; Arnold and Peggy were removed from their lives perhaps for ever. Stephen was with her now and she experienced a sense of happiness beyond all human estimation. She would she could read his mind to learn there his own feelings. Was he, too, conscious of the same delights? A reciprocal feeling was alone necessary to complete the measure of her joy. But he was as non-communicative as ever, totally absorbed in this terrible business that obsessed him. Her riddle, she feared, would remain unanswered. Patriotism, it seemed, was more pressing than love.
The canoe had drifted nearer to the shore. At Stephen's suggestion she aroused herself from her lethargy and alighted on the bank. He soon followed, drawing the canoe on to the shore a little to prevent its wandering away. Marjorie walked through the grass, stooping to pick here and there a little flower which lay smiling at her feet. Stephen stood to one side and looked after her.
"Stephen," she asked, as she returned to him and stood for a moment smiling straight at him, "will you tell me something?"
"Anything you ask," he assured her. "What do you wish to know?"
But she did not inquire further. Her eyes were fixed in earnest attention upon the flowers which she began to arrange into a little bouquet.
There! It was out. She looked at him coquettishly.
"Marjorie!" he exclaimed. "What ever caused you to say that?"
"I scarce know," she replied. "I suppose I just thought so, that was all."
"Would I be here now?" He tried to assure her with a tone of sincerity. "One need not hear a man speak to learn his mind."