Part 29 (1/2)

”But you said,” he entreated, ”you've always said, honey, you'd stand by me, and you will, won't you? This is the only way you can help. You will, dear, please!”

”I 'spose I air got to,” she stammered, s.h.i.+vering. ”Course I do everything ye want me to. But--but--tell me ... why.”

”It's just like this,” Frederick explained reluctantly. ”My mother needs--money. She's got to have it. She's already borrowed a lot of Waldstricker and ... even our lake place is mortgaged to him. His sister loves me--”

The speaker felt the slender body recoil as from a blow.

”Tess!” he cried, ”I don't love her. Oh, can't I get you to understand anything? If you tremble that way, you'll drive me mad. I'm only going to marry her.... Well, to pay the money, that's all.”

He cut and clipped the words as though he hated them, yet finished his explanation determinedly. As keenly as a darting flame, it burned into Tessibel's soul.

”Tell me ... more,” she breathed dizzily.

”It'll only mean you and I will be apart for a little while, Tess,”

stated Frederick. ”When I get back home, I'm coming straight to you, and--”

”She air lovin' ye, ye said?” interrupted Tess, huskily.

”But I don't love _her_, Tess!... I love only you!... You know that, sweetheart!... You hear me, darling?”

”Yep, I hear,” whispered the girl.

Frederick settled back against the rocks, drawing her into his arms.

”My father,” he proceeded more calmly, ”left us without any money. I suppose I didn't realize how hard it's been for mother. She's only just told me she'd mortgaged the lake place to Waldstricker and had borrowed money from him. In a way I've been awfully selfish.... I've only thought of you, dear.”

Of course, now she couldn't tell him that intimate secret! If he knew, he couldn't, he just couldn't do the thing his mother demanded; and she had promised to help him. He had said it was the only way she could be of any service, and her great love rose up and demanded the sacrifice.

Tess scarcely recognized her own voice when she next spoke.

”Did ye tell Madelene--I mean Miss Waldstricker--ye'd marry her?” she asked.

”Well ... yes,” stammered Frederick.

”And ye--ye--ye kissed 'er?... Oh, say ye didn't kiss 'er!... Ye didn't, did ye?”

It was a plea to which Frederick would have given worlds to truthfuly answer, ”No.” But his conscience, evidently sensitive in small matters, compelled an almost inaudible, ”Yes.”

Raging jealousy, unendurable pain, arose within her.

”But ye couldn't--be married--to 'er, Frederick. It ain't possible, it ain't!”

”I know I'm married to you,” the boy a.s.sured her, swiftly. ”I'd only be married to her in the eyes of the world!”

The eyes of the world, the world through which she had so far walked with proudly lifted head! Her dearly cherished love seemed to be tumbling in ignominious ruins, and that very love had left her defenseless. No one would ever know he belonged to her; that she belonged to him. She would have to creep with bowed head in a.s.sumed shame and disgrace even among the squatters.

”I'll die,” she s.h.i.+vered, thinking of the coming spring.

His burning kisses stung her lips, through which his words tumbled one over the other.