"Isn't he?" Sam flung back at him, "well, what of that? I'm glad of it; I hate him." He stood up, his hands clenched, his head flung back. "What difference does it make to me what he is? Her cousin, her friend--what do I care? If she marries me, what do I care for relations?" His grandfather looked up at him aghast; the young, insulted innocence of love blazed in the boy's face. "Gad-a-mercy," said Mr. Wright, in a whisper, "_he doesn't understand!_" He pulled himself on to his shaking legs, and laid his hand on the young man's shoulder. "Sam," he said very gently, "he is her lover, my boy." Sam's lips fell apart; he gasped heavily; his hands slowly opened and shut, and he swayed from side to side; his wild eyes were fixed on that old face, all softened and moved and pitying. Then, with a discordant shriek of laughter, he flung out his open hand and struck his grandfather full in the face. "You old fool! You lie! You lie! Do you hear me?" Benjamin Wright, staggering slightly from the blow, tried to speak, but the boy, still laughing shrilly, leaped down the porch steps, and out into the darkness. "I'll ask her!" he screamed back; "you liar!" CHAPTER XXIII Helena had gone up-stairs to put David to bed. There was some delay in the process, because the little boy wished to look at the stars, and trace out the Dipper. That accomplished however, he was very docile, and willing to get into bed by shinning up the mast of a pirate-ship--which some people might have called a bedpost. After he had fallen asleep, Helena still sat beside him in the darkness, her absent eyes fixed on the little warm body, where, the sheets kicked off, he sprawled in a sort of spread-eagle over the bed. It was very hot, and she would have been more comfortable on the porch, but she could not leave the child. When she was with David, the sense of aching apprehension dulled into the comfort of loving. After a while, with a long sigh she rose, but stopped to draw the sheet over his shoulders; then smiled to see how quickly he kicked it off. She pulled it up again as far as his knees, and to this he resigned himself with a despairing grunt. There was a lamp burning dimly in the hall; as she passed she took it up and went slowly down-stairs. Away from David, her thoughts fell at once into the groove of the past weeks. Each hour she had tormented herself by some new question, and now she was wondering what she should do if, when Lloyd came to fulfill his promise, she should see a shade, oh, even the faintest hint, of hesitation in his manner. Well; she would meet it! She threw her head up, and came down with a quicker step, carrying the lamp high, like a torch. But as she lifted her eyes, in that gust of pride, young Sam Wright stood panting in the doorway. As his strangled voice fell on her ear, she knew that he knew. "I have--come--"