"Go on!" he said.
"I shall think that you are a coward," she said quietly. "I shall think
that you are afraid to use what I risked--well, a great deal--to win
for you."
"It isn't a question of courage," he protested.
"It is," she answered. "You are afraid to do what in your heart you must
know is the right thing, because for a year or two, perhaps even a
decade of years, it will mean a great upheaval. The end must be good. I
am sure of it."
"If Deane and I," he answered, "can also convince ourselves of this, I
shall act. You need not be afraid of that."
"Deane and you!" she repeated, contemptuously. "Who am I, then, in your
counsels? Just a puppet, I suppose? Anyhow, it was I who ran the risk, I
who gave these men into your hands. If you play the poltroon,
everything is over between us, Norris."
He raised his eyes and looked at her in half-unwilling admiration. She
and their hostess had come out on to the roof, just as the two men had
been in the act of descending. A telephone call a few moments later had
summoned Deane away, and his wife, who found the air a little chilly,
had accompanied him. Stella was standing with her head thrown back, her
figure tall and splendid in her evening gown of white satin, thrown into
vivid relief against the background of empty air.
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