She had meant to do, long before now, what he had prevented her doing at the stable,--to confess her deception, to plead for mercy, to beg him to go back. Failing in that, there was Tuesday trotting behind the trap; she could leap out, prove to Haig that her foot was uninjured, and insist upon riding home alone. But now the confession seemed ten times more difficult than it had seemed in the first flush of her resolution. They were far up the Brightwater by this time; a few minutes more would bring them to the branch road that led to Huntington's. Yet how could she tell him? "My foot doesn't hurt any more," she began, compromising with her resolution. "That's because you've been sitting still," he replied. "But it doesn't hurt when I move it. See!" She lifted the foot, and rested it on the dashboard, bending and twisting it. "By which you mean to tell me that I am to go back," he said. "Please!" "No!" he answered curtly. "It wasn't badly sprained at all," she persisted. "I was only--" She caught herself, with a shock. "I was only frightened, I think." "I don't believe you." "But it's the truth." "Then it was not the truth in the first place." There it was now, her best occasion to come out with it. But no; she could not. "It's not so bad as I feared," she stammered. "I trust not. A sprain is a bad business." "But you'll go back now!" she pleaded. "No." "Oh, why won't you?" "I've started." "That's not the reason!" she cried desperately. "True, there's another reason. That makes two." "What other reason?" "I want to ask Huntington about his health." The deviltry had come back into his voice; and just ahead of them she saw the fork of the road. "There's a third reason too, I'm afraid," she answered bitterly. "What's that, do you think?" "You want to punish me!" "Perhaps--a little." "Do you think that's--" "Noble? Manly? Kind? Generous?" he broke in. "Do you really think it's worth your while to punish me?" she asked with passionate irony. "Yes." "But why?" "Because I hope to be let alone hereafter." At that her anger rose. "Do you think that is the way a man should speak to a woman?" "It seems to be the only way to make a woman understand. And even then--" She felt that he shrugged his shoulders in the darkness. "Then I'm sorry for the women you have known!" she retorted. "That should make it all the easier for you to avoid any more accidents in my part of the Park," he answered unperturbed. "It's your own fault if I'm rude. I haven't forced my attentions upon you. If you feel that you've been mistreated, there's another reason--that makes four, doesn't it?--for my going to Huntington's. We'll be there in five minutes. You can tell him."