"It wasn't for myself, Steve," he cried. "It wasn't for what I might get out of it, or--or what it might bring me, I used to scoff at whatever others considered big and fine and clean, but I played it straight, just the same. I played it as well as I knew how--straighter than you'd believe. I thought it would make her happier, because I tried that hard. And she . . . Steve, if I had been a woman--a woman like what I thought she was, little and clean and white--I couldn't have let a man like him so much as touch my little finger! And she--by God, she married him!" The agonized voice broke there--the voice of a boy who had had to learn that it is woman and not women who is fastidious. Garry sat and swallowed, fighting for self-control. His eyes were numb, but Steve's had taken fire, for he knew that the hour for which he had been waiting had come at last. "You've been trying to help me," Garry found his voice again, "you've been trying to throw me a line. And, for a day or two, I tried to catch it, Steve. But it isn't in me to try that hard, any more. Some men do things for what there is in it--the pecuniary reward, I mean; some men--you for instance--because their self respect won't let them stop, win or lose. But now and then there happens one who keeps on trying only because there is one other person, at least, who may be the gladder for his success. I don't expect you to understand; I know it will sound small and cowardly to you. . . . It's too lonesome living, Steve, when there's no one who cares whether you live or not!" "That does not fit your case," Steve objected instantly, "when your danger or your safety keeps a woman watching, white-faced with terror through the night, for your return." Garry propped himself upon one elbow, the better to see the speaker's countenance. "My safety?" he repeated, blankly. "My return?" And then, wanly grateful: "You are not the sort of man who lies convincingly, Steve." And then Stephen O'Mara let him have it--all the story which had lain so many days in his heart. There were times when Garry went even paler during the short recital; times when everything else was submerged by the incredulity that flooded his face. But before Steve had finished the last trace of doubt was gone. Before the end came Garry had bowed his head, this time in flushed, self-conscious wonder which transfigured him. "Miriam Burrell!" he breathed. "Proud, intolerant----" His head came up. The next instant he voiced the words which Steve most wanted to hear. "You shouldn't have told me this," said he. "You had no right, unless----" Steve laughed at him. "God bless you, boy," he exclaimed. "I asked her if I might. Why, don't you understand that she meant to, herself, if I didn't? You see, she is--far, far braver than you are, Garry." Garry lifted his hands and hid his face.