“No!  What would you have thought of me, what would I have thought of myself had I left him to suffocate when I could just as well have brought him out?  Do you think I could ever have looked you in the face again?  You might not have ever known I could have saved him—­but I should have hated myself every hour of my life.  Men are not to be thanked for these things; they are to be despised if they don’t do them.  Can’t you see the difference?”

“But you might have been killed, too!” she exclaimed.  Her own voice was rising, irritation and disappointment swaying it.  “Everybody says it was a miracle you were not.”

“Not a miracle at all.  All I was afraid of was stumbling over something in the dark—­and it was nearly dark—­only a few of the rock lights burning—­and not be able to get on my feet again.  But don’t let us talk about it any more.”

“Yes—­but I will, I must. I must feel right about it all, and I cannot unless you listen.  I shall never forget you for it as long as I live.”  There was a note of pathos in her voice.  Why did he make it so hard for her, she thought.  Why would he not look in her face and see?  Why would he not let her thank him?  “Nothing in the world is so precious to me as daddy, and never will be,” she went on resolutely, driving back the feeling of injustice that surged up in her heart at his attitude—­“and it is you, Mr. Breen, who have given him back to me.  And daddy feels the same way about it; and he is going to tell you so the minute he sees you,” she insisted.  “He has sent you a lot of messages, he says, but they do not count.  Please, now. won’t you let me thank you?”

Jack raised his head.  He had been fingering a tassel on the end of the sofa, missing all the play of feeling in her eyes, taking in nothing but the changes that she rang on that one word “gratitude.”  Gratitude!—­when he loved the ground she stepped on.  But he must face the issue fairly now: 

“No,—­I don’t want you to thank me,” he answered simply.

“Well, what do you want, then?” She was at sea now,—­compass and rudder gone,—­wind blowing from every quarter at once,—­she trying to reach the harbor of his heart while every tack was taking her farther from port.  If the Scribe had his way the whole coast of love would be lighted and all rocks of doubt and misunderstanding charted for just such hapless lovers as these two.  How often a twist of the tiller could send them into the haven of each other’s arms, and yet how often they go ashore and stay ashore and worse still, stay ashore all their lives.

Jack looked into her eyes and a hopeless, tired expression crossed his face.

“I don’t know,” he said in a barely audible voice:—­“I just—­ please, Miss Ruth, let us talk of something else; let me tell you how lovely your gown is and how glad I am you wore it to-day.  I always liked it, and—­”

“No,—­never mind about my gown; I would rather you did not like anything about me than misunderstand me!” The tears were just under the lids;—­one more thrust like the last and they would be streaming down her cheeks.