Page:Arthur Stringer - Gun Runner.djvu/190

 "Yes; it's settled," she echoed, unhappily.

"But this leaves us free!"

"You do not know this man as I do," was her answer.

"But it's over—we're through with him!"

"He is not through with us!"

"But what can he do, when once I've got in touch with the Princeton?"

She looked about the small cabin, from side to side, fornlornly [sic]. It was the first time McKinnon had seen actual fear in her eyes. He even felt that she had been vaguely weighing the place's possibilities against assault.

"Are you afraid?" he asked, not comprehending the source of her distrust. She shook her head in negation.

"This is an American ship," was her answer.

"Then what is it?" he asked, oppressed by some new-born isolation of spirit that barred and walled him away from her.

Again that look of almost contemptuous pity crept into her eyes.

"I'm afraid of you," she replied; "I'm afraid of the future, and how you will surely fail."

There was no sign of tears in her eyes, though he had felt, from her voice, that an outburst was imminent. Yet he found it hard, cruelly hard, to meet her open and unwavering glance.