"For why?" repeated Rose and the thrill in her voice caused him to turn and look at her in surprise. "Figure to yourself, then: That devil he come here and he sneer at you, and he insult me—yes. Many times he insult me that I have to hold myself, so! that I do not kill him. I endure. He send me—-_Dieu!_ that I should say it—he make dirt of me to walk on, to arrive at a man who is high, good, ah, a man! _mon père_, a man like you, one time when you have no fear. He send me. I say nothing. Many times he try, like a dog, to spring at his throat, but always, it is nothing but snap at his heels. Like a dog which he is. Then he come to me and say he is triumph. He get much money. And he tell me go with him. Me! me! he command like he is master and me slave. He steal money from M’sieu Peters and him and me, we go away together, like that, like man and his squaw. And I say nothing. Ah, _mon père_! it is too much—too much. If it be some other man—not M’sieu Peters—then I go. I save you, _mon père_, though it kill me. But—it is too much." She bowed her head, filled with self-reproach, with a knowledge that her father could never see this thing as she did. Jean stared at her, motionless; but his dumb amaze slowly lifted. He came to her and rested his hand lightly on her bowed head. "_Ma Rose—ma belle Rose_—when you have for a good man so big love as that, I would die, with gladness, to know so big happiness is come to you." And he went swiftly from the cabin. At the closing of the door she sprang to it and threw it wide again. "You will not go—now—to-night?" she called. The answer, low, determined, in the tones of the father of that other time, reassured her: "No. We stay. Maybe—who knows?—God is good." She went back and with steady hand lit the lamp and placed it on the table. The noble face was aglow with hopeful pride: he would face it at last, this thing that had embittered both their lives. "Rose!" She started and turned in dismay toward the inner room. He was awake—how long?—and calling her. "Rose!" the call came again, gentle but insistent. "Rose, I—I want you." She stood a moment longer, both hands pressed against her heart, her breath coming in great gasps and in her eyes the frightened look of a child. Then she caught up the lamp and with swift step went in and stood beside the bunk. "Is it then you rest ill, my friend?" she asked softly, and then bent to re-arrange the pillow. Buck’s hand closed over hers. "Rose," he whispered, "Rose—I heard." She slipped to her knees, hiding her face in the pillow, her figure shaking with great tremors and sobs breaking from her so that she could scarcely speak. "Oh, I am ashamed," she said brokenly, "I am ashamed."