"She's wrong." Meriweather was tense. "If I could have the woman I want, I'd tramp the roads with her."
A pain stabbed Sally's heart. She knew the woman he wanted, and the woman was not herself. Yet how gladly she would have tramped with him—muddy roads, dusty roads, in any weather!
"I wish I were back again in the diplomatic service," he was saying. "I've half a notion to get back."
"But you mustn't go away. We can't spare you."
"I'm not so important as that. If I dropped out, the world would go on just the same."
"Not my world, Merry."
She said it lightly, and he took it lightly. He could not know, of course, how he was hurting her—shallow little Sally, who had no depths.
And now Winslow was coming up the stairs. "You two are selfish," he said. "May I help you look at the stars?"
He sat down and talked with them. He had no idea of leaving the field to Merry. He had definitely made up his mind to marry Sally. And always when he made up his mind he got what he wanted. That was his way.
Years ago there had been another wife, a plain little thing, incurably domestic. She had not kept step with her husband's growing prosperity and had died just in time to escape acute unhappiness. What Winslow needed now was some one to crown his possessions. He had felt that he must not hurry in his choice—that the golden apple he held in his hand was a treasure not to be lightly bestowed.
He had considered, in turn, three women—Mrs. Hulburt, Sally, Hildegarde. Early in the race Mrs.
