"I don't believe he did make her think. He hinted that--that there'd been something between them, but that--that with girls of that sort you--you couldn't call it love."
"Because--no, I won't, Bob! I'm your mother. I must make things easier for you, and not harder, and so--"
"It will make things easiest for me to know the truth. So go on! Out with it! Tell me just what he said."
"He said it--it couldn't be love--with a girl whom--whom anyone could--"
He sprang from the rail, holding up his hand.
"Wait a minute, mother! Jennie's my wife. I'm her husband. I believe in her."
With her speed in trimming her sails to the wind, Junia caught the direction.
"I don't want you _not_ to believe in her, Bob. I didn't want to say any of the things that--that you've been dragging out of me. You know that."
"Yes, I know that, old lady, and I'm grateful. I had to drag them out and know the worst that could be said, so as to contradict it in--in my heart."
"Yes, in my heart. It's where I'm strongest--just as it's where dad is strongest, too, if he'd only been true to himself. But that's a side issue. What I want to say now--and what I'd like you to understand--is that I _know_ that Jennie is good and pure and true and one of the sweetest and loveliest spirits God ever made. I know it!"
Junia couldn't be as feminine as she was without gazing in awe and admiration at the tall, upright figure, which seemed taller and more upright for the moonlight.
"Would you know it--mind you, I'm only _putting_ it this way--would you know it--with her own evidence to the contrary?"
"Yes, mother; I should know it--with her own evidence to the contrary."
"I must really go in now, dear. I'm so afraid of catching cold. But--but good night!"
Having kissed him, she went down the steps, turning once more to look back at him. Silhouetted against the oblong of light between two rough pilasters, he was mechanically taking out his case and selecting a cigarette.
"You're splendid, Bob," she said, with a ring of sincerity that startled him. "That's the way to love a woman. If there were only more men like you! And--I _will_ say it, in spite of the things you've just made me confess--there must be something very, very good in a girl to--to call forth that kind of love."