I came to tell you that and nothing more,
George, I swear it. But when you were kind to me and pitied me, I was
mad--wild! I wanted to win you first out of your own love. I wanted you
to respond to MINE before you knew your wife was faithless. Yet I would
have saved her if I could. Listen, George! A moment more before you
speak!"
Then she hurriedly told him all; the whole story of his wife's dishonor,
from her entrance into the sitting-room with Van Loo, her later appeal
for concealment from her husband's unexpected presence, to the use she
made of that concealment to fly with her lover. She spared no detail,
and even repeated the insult Mrs. Barker had cast upon her with the
triumphant reproach that her husband would not believe her. "Perhaps,"
she added bitterly, "you may not believe me now. I could even stand that
from you, George, if it could make you happier; but you would still have
to believe it from others. The people at the Boomville Hotel saw them
leave it together."
"I do believe you," he said slowly, but with downcast eyes, "and if I
did not love you before you told me this I could love you now for the
part you have taken; but"--He stopped.
"You love her still," she burst out, "and I might have known it.
Perhaps," she went on distractedly, "you love her the more that you have
lost her. It is the way of men--and women."
"If I had loved her truly," said Barker, lifting his frank eyes to hers,
"I could not have touched YOUR lips.
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