"Good idea and night. Go back to bed. Many thanks, until I can explain."
He walked out of the telephone exchange unmindful of the wondering stare of the operator. He strolled to the small station and sat down on a baggage truck to smoke and wait for a north-bound morning train. The cigarette glowed idly and the coal shrank into its shell of ash. He leaned his head back against the wall of the building and fixed his eyes on a faint star, low in the north.
He reflected.
This was the thing he could do. He could fight his father, Phil Rowe, Jim Harris; all these other men and influences that were aligned against Helen Foraker. He could put his best into that fight and make a courageous attempt to drive away the menace he had brought upon her. He owed her that; he would square his account.
He felt just the least bit heroic as he planned that fight and a tinge of bitterness crept into his attitude toward the girl. She had professed to give him her love, but when the crisis came the forest was uppermost in her mind. Her life, she had said it was, and perhaps that had been truth because she had shown no willingness to give him the benefit of the doubt—after she had given him her caresses. Her ready defiance which he had once thought splendid seemed a weakness, now.
And yet before the north-bound train stopped for him he became cold and lonely and was prompted to go to her and plead his case. But he could not do that, he told himself. He had been wrong, he had dodged and twisted and failed to meet the issue, when it concerned this girl who never dodged! He was small, small beside her, and her consequence seemed even greater as he pictured her, backed
