Page:Honore Willsie--Judith of the godless valley.djvu/286

 Inez Rodman. I allowed Douglas to bring her to the table and I ate with her though my gore rose in my throat. Because I felt that my only chance to win the confidence of Lost Chief was to countenance for a time that which cannot be countenanced. But I am through. How long do you think you can be a friend to Inez, Judith, and not become like her?"

Judith jumped to her feet. "O, I am so sick of this kind of thing!" she cried.

"Fowler is dead right and you know it, Judith," said Douglas.

"You don't dare to say these things to her face!" Judith's eyes were full of the tears of anger.

"I'd just as soon," Douglas grinned.

"I'm going to tell her what I think of her and what she is doing to the youth of Lost Chief," stated Mr. Fowler.

"She's not a bit worse for Lost Chief than Charleton Falkner," exclaimed Judith. "And you don't pick on him!"

"He couldn't be as bad as Inez," insisted the preacher. "There is nothing so bad for a community as her kind of a woman."

"That just isn't so, Mr. Fowler," protested Douglas. "Charleton is worse than Inez ever thought of being. All I'm complaining about is her influence on Judith."

"You both talk as if I had no mind of my own!" Judith said indignantly. "If you knew the temptations I'd withstood, you'd not be so free with your comments about me. And if all I'm going to get when I come up here is criticism, I'm not coming any more. Don't you follow me, Douglas!" and Judith, in her short khaki suit, swept out of the cabin with a grace and dignity that would have done credit to a velvet train.