“You were right!  No one could blame you,” said Blair eagerly, seizing her hand.

But she disengaged it gently, and went on:—­

“And now you wonder why I gave him a meeting here?”

“I wonder at nothing but your courage and patience in all this suffering!” said Blair fervently; “and at your forgiving me for so cruelly misunderstanding you.”

“But you must learn all.  When I first saw MacGlowrie under his assumed name, I fainted, for I was terrified and believed he knew I was here and had come to expose me even at his own risk.  That was why I hesitated between going away or openly defying him.  But it appears he was more frightened than I at finding me here—­he had supposed I had changed my name after the divorce, and that Mrs. MacGlowrie, Laurel Spring, was his cousin’s widow.  When he found out who I was he was eager to see me and agree upon a mutual silence while he was here.  He thought only of himself,” she added scornfully, “and Colonel Starbottle’s recognition of him that night as the convicted swindler was enough to put him to flight.”

“And the colonel never suspected that you were his wife?” said Blair.

“Never!  He supposed from the name that he was some relation of my husband, and that was why he refused to tell it—­for my sake.  The colonel is an old fogy—­and pompous—­but a gentleman—­as good as they make them!”

A slightly jealous uneasiness and a greater sense of shame came over Blair.

“I seem to have been the only one who suspected and did not aid you,” he said sadly, “and yet God knows”—­

The widow had put up her slim hand in half-smiling, half-pathetic interruption.

“Wait!  I have not told you everything.  When I took over the responsibility of being Allen MacGlowrie’s widow, I had to take over her relations and her history as I gathered it from the frontiersmen.  I never frightened any grizzly—­I never jabbed anybody with the scissors; it was she who did it.  I never was among the Injins—­I never had any fighting relations; my paw was a plain farmer.  I was only a peaceful Blue Grass girl—­there!  I never thought there was any harm in it; it seemed to keep the men off, and leave me free—­until I knew you!  And you know I didn’t want you to believe it—­don’t you?”

She hid her flushed face and dimples in her handkerchief.

“But did you never think there might be another way to keep the men off, and sink the name of MacGlowrie forever?” said Blair in a lower voice.

“I think we must be going back now,” said the widow timidly, withdrawing her hand, which Blair had again mysteriously got possession of in her confusion.

“But wait just a few minutes longer to keep me company,” said Blair pleadingly.  “I came here to see a patient, and as there must have been some mistake in the message—­I must try to discover it.”

“Oh!  Is that all?” said the widow quickly.  “Why?”—­she flushed again and laughed faintly—­“Well!  I am that patient!  I wanted to see you alone to explain everything, and I could think of no other way.  I’m afraid I’ve got into the habit of thinking nothing of being somebody else.”