Presently she looked up at him.
"You're much better to-day," she said; "better than you've been since--since that night!" "Oh, I'm all right," he answered; "right as can be." He suddenly turned on her, put his hand upon her arm, and said: "Come, now, tell me what there was between you and Vanne Castine--once upon a time.
"He was in love with me five years ago," she said.
"And five years ago you were in love with him, eh ?" "How dare you say that to me!" she answered.

"I never was.

I always hated him." She told her lie with unscrupulous directness.

He did not believe her; but what did that matter! It was no reason why he should put her at a disadvantage, and, strangely enough, he did not feel any contempt for her because she told the lie, nor because she had once cared for Castine.

Probably in those days she had never known anybody who was very much superior to Castine.