Jean was positive of that, for as Blue was speaking those last revealing words Bill's heavy boots had resounded on the gravel path outside.

Yet something in Bill's look or in the way Blue averted his lean face or in the entrance of Bill at that particular moment, or all these together, seemed to Jean to add further mystery to the long secret causes leading up to the Jorth-Isbel war.
Did Bill know what Blue knew?
Jean had an inkling that he did.

And on the moment, so perplexing and bitter, Jean gazed out the door, down the deserted road to where his dead father lay, white-haired and ghastly in the sunlight.
"Blue, you could have kept that to yourself, as well as your real name," interposed Jean, with bitterness.

"It's too late now for either to do any good....

But I appreciate your friendship for dad, an' I'm ready to help carry out your plan." That decision of Jean's appeared to put an end to protest or argument from Blaisdell or any of the others.