Page:Barbour--Peggy in the rain.djvu/150

 "Was it?" she asked thoughtfully. "If I cared would I have come?" She laughed to herself. "Why try to fathom a woman's reason for doing a thing, Mr. Ames? We are handicapped from birth with an infinite capacity for doing the wrong thing."

"Then—you don't care?" he persisted.

"For you—in that way?" she asked. "What can I answer? If I say no—perhaps it won't be true. If I say yes I'm confessing my weakness and wrongness."

"I can't see that!"

"You don't care to. If I really did care I should know better than to come with you to-night. You see that, don't you?"

"If you care, Peggy, why not come with me?"

There was no answer for a moment. The car ran swiftly, almost noiselessly between country walls and farms. Overhead the sky was luminous with stars and in their faces a damp breeze hinted of the sea.

"I'll tell you," she said at last. She was looking straight ahead at the road that rushed toward them in the broad glare of the searchlights, and