ect, the pity--oh, what shall I
say?--which I have always felt for you--the regard----"

"Regard! What do you mean?"

"I did not mean regard, but the--the wish to see you succeed, to help
you, if I could, to take your place among men. I told you that but
yesterday."

She was all confusion now. He seemed pitiless.

"I have listened long enough to have my curiosity aroused. I shall
have somewhat to ponder--on the trail to the West."

"Then you mean that you will go on?"

"Yes!"

"You do not understand----"

"No! I understand only that Mr. Jefferson has never abandoned a plan
or a promise or a friend. Shall I, then, who have been his scholar and
his friend?"

"Ah, you two! What manner of men are you that you will not listen to
reason? He is high in power. Will you not also listen to the call of
your own ambition? Why, in that country below, you might hold a
station as proud as that of Mr. Jefferson himself. Will you throw that
away, for the sake of a few dried skins and flowers? You speak of
being devoted to your country. What is devotion--what is your
country? You have no heart--that I know well; but I credited you with
the brain and the ambition of a man!"

He sat motionless under the sting of her reproaches; and as some
reflection came to her upon the savagery of her own words, she laughed
bitterly.

"Think you that I would have come here for any other man?" she
demanded. "Think you that I would ask of you anything to my own
dishonor, or to your dishonor? But now you do not listen. You will not
come back--even for me!"

In answer he simply bent and kissed her hand, stepped from the
carriage, raised his hat. Yet he hesitated for half an instant and
turned back.

"Theodosia," said he, "it is hard for me not to do anything you ask of
me--you do not know how hard; but surely you understand that I am a
soldier and am under orders. I have no option. It seems to me that the
plans of your father and his friends should be placed at once before
Mr. Jefferson. It is strange they sent you, a woman, as their
messenger! You have done all that a woman could. No other woman in the
world could have done as much with me. But--my men are waiting for
me."

This time he did not turn back again.

* * * * *

Colonel Burr's carriage returned more slowly than it had come. It was
a dejected occupant who at last made her way, still at an early hour,
to the door of her father's house.

Burr