"
"It was you!" she said.
"Why he did so," I continued, disregarding the interruption, "is
more than I can guess, and more than I care to know. I have not
many friends, nor am I very susceptible to friendship; but no man
shall drive me from a place by terror. I had camped in Graden Sea-
Wood ere he came; I camp in it still. If you think I mean harm to
you or yours, madam, the remedy is in your hand. Tell him that my
camp is in the Hemlock Den, and to-night he can stab me in safety
while I sleep."
With this I doffed my cap to her, and scrambled up once more among
the sand-hills. I do not know why, but I felt a prodigious sense
of injustice, and felt like a hero and a martyr; while, as a matter
of fact, I had not a word to say in my defence, nor so much as one
plausible reason to offer for my conduct. I had stayed at Graden
out of a curiosity natural enough, but undignified; and though
there was another motive growing in along with the first, it was
not one which, at that period, I could have properly explained to
the lady of my heart.
Certainly, that night, I thought of no one else; and, though her
whole conduct and position seemed suspicious, I could not find it
in my heart to entertain a doubt of her integrity. I could have
staked my life that she was clear of blame, and, though all was
dark at the present, that the explanation of the mystery would show
her part in these events to be both right and needful.
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