hate to think it would."

MacRae did not find any apt reply to that. His mind was in an agonized
muddle, in which he could only perceive one or two things with any
degree of clearness. Betty loved him. He was sure of that. He could tell
her that he loved her. And then? Therein arose the conflict. Marriage
was the natural sequence of love. And when he contemplated marriage with
Betty he found himself unable to detach her from her background, in
which lurked something which to MacRae's imagination loomed sinister,
hateful. To make peace with Horace Gower--granting that Gower was
willing for such a consummation--for love of his daughter struck MacRae
as something very near to dishonor. And if, contrariwise, he repeated to
Betty the ugly story which involved her father and his father, she would
be harassed by irreconcilable forces even if she cared enough to side
with him against her own people. MacRae was gifted with acute
perception, in some things. He said to himself despairingly--nor was it
the first time that he had said it--that you cannot mix oil and water.

He could do nothing at all. That was the sum of his ultimate
conclusions. His hands were tied. He could not go back and he could not
go on. He sat beside Betty, longing to take her in his arms and still
fighting stoutly against that impulse. He was afraid of his impulses.

A faint moisture broke out on his face with that acute nervous strain. A
lump rose chokingly in his throat. He stared out at the white-crested
seas that came marching up the Gulf before a rising wind until his eyes
grew misty. Then he slid down off the log and laid his head on Betty's
knee. A weight of dumb grief oppressed him. He wanted to cry, and he was
ashamed of his weakness.

Betty's fingers stole caressingly over his bare head, rumpled his hair,
stroked his hot cheek.

"Johnny-boy," she said at last, "what is it that comes like a fog
between you and me?"

MacRae did not answer.

"I make love to you quite openly," Betty went on. "And I don't seem to
be the least bit ashamed of doing so. I'm not a silly kid. I'm nearly as
old as you are, and I know quite well what I want--which happens to be
you. I love you, Silent John. The man is supposed to be the pursuer. But
I seem to have that instinct myself. Besides," she laughed tremulously,
"this is leap year. And, remember, you kissed me. Or did I kiss you?
Which was it, Jack?"

MacRae seated himself on the log beside her. He put his a