punish me for it--through my brother? You mean to make him suffer. You
will kill him!" Her voice rose to an accent of terror. "But I only
said it because he is my brother, my own brother. Cannot you
understand what that means to me? Cannot you understand why I said
it?"

We stood facing each other, I, staring at her miserably, and she
breathing quickly, and holding her hand to her side as though she had
been running a long distance.

"No," I said in a low voice. It was very hard for me to speak at all.
"No, I cannot understand."

I pulled off my hat again, and stood before her crushing it in my
hands.

"Why didn't you trust me?" I said, bitterly. "How could you doubt what
I would do? I trusted you. From the moment you came riding toward me,
I thanked God for the sight of such a woman. For making anything so
beautiful."

I stopped, for I saw I had again offended. At the words she drew back
quickly, and her eyes shone with indignation. She looked at me as
though I had tried to touch her with my hand. But I spoke on without
heeding her. I repeated the words with which I had offended.

"Yes," I said, "I thanked God for anything so noble and so beautiful.
To me, you could do no wrong. But you! You judged me before you even
knew my name. You said I was a cad who went about armed to fight
unarmed men. To you I was a coward who could be frightened off by a