Page:The Outcry (London, Methuen & Co., 1911).djvu/168

154 !"—she took the question from his mouth. "I believe in such a cause exactly as you do—and found a lesson, at Dedborough, in your frankness and your faith."

"Then you'll help me no end," he said all simply and sincerely.

"You've helped me already"—that she gave him straight back. And on it they stayed a moment, their strenuous faces more intensely communing.

"You're very wonderful—for a girl!" Hugh brought out.

"One has to be a girl, naturally, to be a daughter of one's house," she laughed; "and that's all I am of ours—but a true and a right and a straight one."

He glowed with his admiration. "You're splendid!"

That might be or not, her light shrug intimated; she gave it, at any rate, the go-by and more exactly stated her case. "I see our situation."

"So do I, Lady Grace!" he cried with the strongest emphasis. "And your father only doesn't."

"Yes," she said for intelligent correction—