The Fighting Chance

But she shook her head impatiently, saying: "I don't know whose dance it is, and I don't care. Please go on. It is--is pleasant. I like Mr. Siward; I like to hear men speak of him as you do. I like you for doing it. If you should ever come to care for my friendship that is the best passport to it--your loyalty to Mr. Siward."

"No man can truthfully speak otherwise than I have spoken," he said gravely.

"No, not of these things. But--you know w-what is--is usually said when his name comes up among men."

"Do you mean about his habits?" he asked simply.

"Yes. Is it not an outrage to drag in that sort of thing? It angers me intensely, Mr. Plank. Why do they do it? Is there a single one among them qualified to criticise Mr. Siward? And besides, it is not true any more! … is it?--what was once said of him with--with some truth? Is it?"

The dull red blood mantled Plank's heavy visage. The silence grew grim as he did his slow, laborious thinking, the while his eyes, expressionless and almost opaque in the dim light, never left her's, until, under the unchanging, merciless inspection, the mask dropped for an instant from her anxious face, and he saw what he saw.

He was no fool. What he had come to believe she at last had only confirmed; and now the question became simple: was she worth enlightening? And by what title did she demand his confidence?

"You ask me if it is true any more. You mean about his habits. If I answer you it is because I cannot be indifferent to what concerns him. But before I answer I ask you this: Would your interest in his fortunes matter to him?"

She waited, head bent; then: "I don't know, Mr. Plank," very low.

"Did your interest in his fortunes ever concern him?"

"Yes, once."

He looked at her sternly, his jaw squaring until his heavy under lip projected. "Within my definition of friendship, is he your friend?"

"You mean he--"

"No, I mean you! I can answer for him. How is it with you? Do you return what he gives--if there is really friendship between you? Or do you take what he offers, offering nothing in return?"

She had turned rather white under the direct impact of the questions. The jarring repetition of his voice itself was like the dull echo of distant blows. Yet it never occurred to her to resent it, nor his attitude, nor his self-assumed privilege. She did not care; she no longer cared what he said to her or thought about her; nor did she care that her mask had fallen at last. It was not what he was saying, but what her own heart repeated so heavily that drove the colour from her face. Not he, but she herself had become the pitiless attorney for the prosecution; not his voice, but the clamouring conscience within her demanded by what right she used the name of friendship to characterise the late relations between her and the man to whom she had denied herself.