But at this perilous pass the husband’s road ran truer than the lover’s.  Richard believed her capable of this hard-hearted thing and went on loving her blindly in spite of it.  But as for me, I said I would never give belief an inch of standing-room; that had I stood in Ephraim Yeates’s shoes, having the witness of my own eyes and ears, I would still have found excuse and exculpation for her.

I stole a glance at Jennifer.  He was sitting with his face in his hands, a silent figure of a strong man humbled.  He had called her a Delilah, and the green withes of her binding cut sore into the flesh.

“You say you love her, Dick; can you believe her capable of this, and yet go on loving her?” I asked.

He let me see his face.  It was haggard and grief-marred.

“I’d pay the devil’s own price could I say ‘no’ to that, Jack.  But I can not.”

“Then I swear I love her better than you do, Richard Jennifer.  She hates me well—­God knows she has good cause to hate me fiercely; yet I would trust her with my life.”

I looked to see him pin me down at this; and though the words had fairly shaped and said themselves, I laid fast hold of my courage and was prepared to make them good.  But he would only smile and draw the bearskin cover over me, tucking me in as tenderly as a mother, and saying very gently: 

“So she has bewitched you, too; and now there are two poor fools of love instead of one.  But you are stronger than I, Jack.  You will break the spell and put it down and live beyond it, and that I never shall—­God help me!” And with that, he went to his own bed beside the fire, telling me I must lie quiet and try to sleep.

I did lie quiet, but sleep came not, nor did I woo it.  For long past the time when I could hear his measured breathing, I lay awake to plan how I might draw the baronet’s man-hunt to myself, and so free my loyal Richard of the peril that by rights was mine.

XVII

SHOWING HOW LOVE TOOK TOLL OF FRIENDSHIP

For some few days after Jennifer’s narrow escape at the entrance to our hiding place, the Cherokees were hot upon our scent, quartering the forest on both banks of the river, determined, as it seemed, to hunt or starve us out.

It was in this time of siege that I came to know, as I had not known before, the depth and tenderness of my dear lad’s love for me.  While the life-tide was at its ebb and I was querulous and helpless weak, he was my leech and nurse and heartening friend in one.  And later, when the tide was fairly turned and I had found my soldier’s appetite again, he spent many of the nights abroad and never let me guess what risks he ran to fetch me dainties from the outer world.

In this night raiding no danger was too great to hold him back from serving me.  Once, when we were washing down our evening meal of meat and maize cake with plain cold water, I mourned the good wine idling in its bin at Jennifer House.  At that, without a word to me, he took the whole night for a perilous adventure and fetched a dozen bottles of the Jennifer port to make me choke and strangle at the thought of what its bringing had cost in toil and hazard.