to take a fancy to me, and goodness knows I liked him. But you
mustn't feel you've got to do this thing. He wrote me it was only a
suggestion. You are absolutely free--he wrote me so--to go to Bradley
or----"

"No." She rose to her feet. "I shan't go to Bradley or anybody but you.
I am like him, Cap'n Kendrick; I trust you. I have come to know you and
to believe in you. I like you. Why, you don't know how glad I was to
find that he wanted you to do this for me. Glad! I--I felt----"

"Why, Elizabeth!"

He had not meant to speak. The words were forced from him involuntarily.
Her tone, her eyes, the eager earnestness in her voice.... He did not
say any more, nor did he look at her. Instead he looked at the patchwork
comforter which had fallen from his knees to the floor, and fervently
hoped that he had not already said too much. He stooped and picked up
the comforter.

"And you will do it for me, won't you?" she pleaded.

"I can't. It wouldn't be right."

"Then I shall not take the money at all. _He_ gave it to me, _he_ asked
me--the very last thing he asked was that you should do it. He put the
trust in your hands. And you won't do it--for him--or for me?"

"Well, but--but---- Oh, good Lord! how can I?"

"Why can't you?"

The real reason he could not tell her. According to Kent--whether
inspired by Phillips or not made little difference--people were already
whispering and hinting. How much more would they hint and whisper if
they knew that he had taken charge of her money? The thought had not
occurred to her, of course; the very idea was too ridiculous for her to
imagine; but that made but one more reason why he must think for her.

"No," he said, again. "No, I can't."

"But why? You haven't told me why."

He tried to tell her why, but his words were merely repetitions of what
he had said before. He was not a good business man, he did not know how
to handle money, even his own money. The judge had been very ill when he
wrote those letters, if he had been well and himself he never would have
thought of him as trustee. She listened for a time, her impatience
growing. Then she rose.

"Very well," she said. "Then I shall not accept the twenty thousand. To
me one wish of Judge Knowles' is as sacred as the other. He wanted you
to take that trust just as much as he wanted me to have the money. If
you won't respect one wish I shall not respect the other."

He could not believe she meant it, but she certainly look