It was not until she had climbed to Caroline Smith’s room and opened the door that her determination faltered.  For there she saw the girl lying on her bed weeping.  And it seemed to the poor, bewildered brain of Ruth Tolliver, as if the form of Ronicky Doone, passionate and eager as before, stood at her side and begged her again to send Caroline Smith across the street to a lifelong happiness, and she could do it.  Though Mark had ordered the girl to be confined to her room until further commands were given on the subject, no one in the house would think of questioning Ruth Tolliver, if she took the girl downstairs to the street and told her to go on her way.

She closed the door softly and, going to the bed, touched the shoulder of Caroline.  The poor girl sat up slowly and turned a stained and swollen face to Ruth.  If there was much to be pitied there was something to be laughed at, also.  Ruth could not forbear smiling.  But Caroline was clutching at her hands.

“He’s changed his mind?” she asked eagerly.  “He’s sent you to tell me that he’s changed his mind, Ruth?  Oh, you’ve persuaded him to it—­like an angel—­I know you have!”

Ruth Tolliver freed herself from the reaching hands, moistened the end of a towel in the bathroom and began to remove the traces of tears from the face of Caroline Smith.  That face was no longer flushed, but growing pale with excitement and hope.

“It’s true?” she kept asking.  “It is true, Ruth?”

“Do you love him as much as that?”

“More than I can tell you—­so much more!”

“Try to tell me then, dear.”

Talking of her love affair began to brighten the other girl, and now she managed a wan smile.  “His letters were very bad.  But, between the lines, I could read so much real manhood, such simple honesty, such a heart, such a will to trust!  Ruth, are you laughing at me?”

“No, no, far from that!  It’s a thrilling thing to hear, my dear.”

For she was remembering that in another man there might be found these same qualities.  Not so much simplicity, perhaps, but to make up for it, a great fire of will and driving energy.

“But I didn’t actually know that I was in love.  Even when I made the trip West and wrote to him to meet the train on my return—­even then I was only guessing.  When he didn’t appear at the station I went cold and made up my mind that I would never think of him again.”

“But when you saw him in the street, here?”

“John Mark had prepared me and hardened me against that meeting, and I was afraid even to think for myself.  But, when Ronicky Doone—­bless him!—­talked to me in your room, I knew what Bill Gregg must be, since he had a friend who would venture as much for him as Ronicky Doone did.  It all came over me in a flash.  I did love him—­I did, indeed!”

“Yes, yes,” whispered Ruth Tolliver, nodding and smiling faintly.  “I remember how he stood there and talked to you.  He was like a man on fire.  No wonder that a spark caught in you, Caroline.  He—­he’s a—­very fine-looking fellow, don’t you think, Caroline?”