Ridge's voice was not quite natural. A biting shame was harassing him, whose only alleviation was the possibility that nobody--or at least Dorothy--had noticed in the excitement of the part that he had played. He was saying to himself, wretchedly, that he had not known it of himself, that he could not have believed it of himself. How could he have done it--have had the impulse, even, to leap to safety and leave her behind? Had she seen--had she seen? Yet when, after a time, she leaned forward and spoke to him of her own accord, her voice was so kind, rang with such a golden note, that he felt with sudden relief that she could not have seen. He turned about and began to talk again, growing more and more secure in his belief that at the supreme moment of danger nobody had thought of anybody but himself or herself, and by the time the car drew into the home town Jordan was serene again. Under the first of the arc lights Julius took counsel with his watch. He swung about and spoke tersely: "You and I'd better jump out here and make the station, Waldron. It's closer to train time than I thought. We're awfully obliged to you, Ridge." "We'll go that way. It's only a block or two out of our course," Jordan insisted, eager to speed the parting guest. The car drew toward the string of electrics which lighted the small suburban station at which Waldron had arrived in the morning. The glancing, silver-arrowed radiance illumined the whole interior of the car under its wide-spreading, hooded top. Waldron could see Dorothy's brilliant eyes, the curve of her lips, the rose colour in her cheeks repeating warmly the deeper rose colour of the little silk bonnet which kept her dark hair in order--all but one wild-willed little curly strand which had escaped and was blowing about her face. Dorothy, in her turn, could see Waldron's clean-cut, purposeful face, his deep-set eyes, the modelling of his strong mouth and chin, the fine line of his cheek. As they had looked at each other when they first met, so they looked at each other again before they parted. Yet between that meeting and that parting something had happened. It was in his eyes as he looked at her; it was in her eyes as for one instant, before she dropped bewildering lashes, she gave him back his look. It meant that South America was not so far away but that a voyager could come back over the same high seas which had conveyed him there. And that when he came-- "I'm grateful to you, Mr. Jordan," Waldron said, shaking hands beside the car, "more than I can say to you. You have done me a greater kindness than you know. Good-night--to you all!" He went away with Julius without a glance behind after the salute of his lifted hat, which included everybody. By some common impulse the rest of the party all looked after the two as they walked away toward the station door. "Seems like an uncommonly nice chap," was Ashworth's comment. "I'll wager he's something, somewhere."