Page:Ruth of the U.S.A. (IA ruthofusa00balm).pdf/329

 became best acquainted—with O'Malley and a Canadian captain named Lownes; when the Irishman spoke of the girl waiting for him and when Lownes—who was married—told of his wife, Gerry mentioned Ruth; and—yes—he boasted a bit of her.

"I thought," O'Malley said to him later, "that you were engaged to an English girl, the daughter of an earl or such."

Gerry colored a little. "We've been good friends; that's all, Michael; never more than that. When we happened to go to America on the same boat, our papers over there tried to make more of it; and some of their stuff reached this side."

This was true enough; but it left out of account the fact that, not long ago, Gerry had hoped himself some day to make "more of it"; and, later, he had not tried. Now, as he thought back he knew that Agnes had never loved him; and he had not loved her. This strange girl whom he had known at first as Cynthia, and then as Ruth Alden, had stirred in him not only doubts of the ideas by which he had lived; she had roused him to requirements of friendship—of love, let him admit it now—which he had not felt before. Their ride together away from Mirevaux, when he sat almost helpless and swaying at her side after she had saved his life, became to him the day of discovery of her and of himself. He could see her so clearly as her eyes blurred with tears when she told him about "1583;" and he knew that then he loved her. Their supper together at Compiègne became to him the happiest hour of his life. He had felt for her more strongly that evening of their last parting