He rose and moved restlessly; his face white. "No one knows what it meant to give her up. She believed those damned reports and gave me no chance to prove the truth, and I--, why--it would not have mattered of what she was accused; the blackest charges proved against her,--I would have held her and fought the world for her, innocent or guilty. I believed she loved me as I loved her--she refused to hear my story." "Did she never know the truth?" asked Powell. "Returned my ring, asked me to spare her the humiliation of talking to me. Yet, after I came here, I wrote telling her that the man in my automobile with that woman, was not myself. You remember the newspapers spared the woman's name. She had a husband and child--eloping with that cad, Brunton. Cheap machine broke down at two o'clock in the night. I recognized them. Put 'em in my machine and told her to get back home before it was too late. Oh, she was ready enough then to be decent. Brunton took her to her door, then he went to his place, but that fool reporter saw the number of the machine, and wrote the story. You know it. Woman's name kept out, my name not mentioned outright, but description sufficient to identify me beyond doubt. Couldn't sue the paper, my lawyer said, and Brunton lit out for Europe. Rotten mess all around. "I wrote the full truth to Nell, begged a word from her as a man dying of thirst begs for a drop of water. She never answered the letter. A year later I wrote again, and that one was returned unclaimed." "You say that the second letter came back unclaimed," spoke Powell, "but, you have no proof that the first one ever reached her. Had you thought of that?" "Yes. Both letters had my Arizona address on the envelope as well as inside. When I did not hear in reply to the first letter, and it was not returned to me, I communicated with the Dead Letter Office, but no such letter had been turned over to that department. The only logical conclusion was that she did not wish to answer." The doctor made no comment. Traynor's reasoning was too convincing for suggestions. "Yet, I made a second effort," went on the boss of the Diamond H. "After that, there was nothing more to do but accept the situation. Now you know the truth, Cuthbert. No other woman will ever fill her place in my life,--but, I cannot keep her out of my thoughts, day or night." "I'm sorry I spoke, old man," answered the doctor. "I'm glad you did," replied Traynor. "Now, you understand." As the shadows lengthened on the prairie the two friends smoked and spoke of other things. And yet--both Traynor and Powell--and many another--had read with the careless glance of the unscathed, the account of a train wreck in Kansas, in which the loss of life had been appalling, and the loss of mail had not been mentioned. CHAPTER TWO