Suddenly she found her voice. "Do not misunderstand me," she said rapidly.
"I have done the little that I have done out of gratitude." She faced him
now, but without meeting his eyes. "I told you, remember, that you would
understand some day what I meant by that, and the day has come. I owed you
more gratitude than a woman ever owed a man before, I think, and I would
have died to pay a part of it. I set every gossip's tongue in Rouen
clacking at the very start, in the merest amateurish preparation for the
work Mr. Macauley gave me. That was nothing. And the rest has been the
happiest time in my life. I have only pleased myself, after all!"

"What gratitude did you owe me?"

"What gratitude? For what you did for my father."

"I have only seen your father once in my life--at your table at the dance
supper, that night."

"Listen. My father is a gentle old man with white hair and kind eyes. You
saw my uncle, that night; he has been as good to me as a father, since I
was seven years old, and he gave me his name by law and I lived with him.
My father came to see me once a year; I never came to see him. He always
told me everything was well with him; that his life was happy. Once he
lost the little he had left to him in the world, his only way of making
his living. He had no friends; he was hungry and desperate, and he
wandered. I was dancing and going about wearing jewels--only--I did not
know. All the time the brave heart wrote me happy letters. I should have
known, for there was one who did, and who saved him. When at last I came
to see my father, he told me. He had written of his idol before; but it
was not till I came that he told it all to me. Do you know what I felt?