She nodded, blushing hotly.
"You?"
"Yes--please."
"Not Landis?"
"She was my old nurse. I've always called her Aunty Landis."
"_Roland Cary_ that they all talked about! Not a man, but _you_?"
"Are you awfully disappointed? I was named after my great-uncle, General
Roland Cary."
"Great Scott! Polly Cresap said _Roland Cary_ was charming. Mrs. Dick
Randall told me that he--no, that _Roland Cary_ was a 'dee-vil.' Cresap
quite raved over--over Roland Cary. I've been as blind as an owl!"
"It was wicked of me to fool you so long, but it was such a joke. All my
cousins always call me Roland Cary, as if it were my only name."
"Then you're Elizabeth Cary--the Miss Cary of Baltimore that people made
such a fuss about when you came out last year--'the' Cary of 'the'
Carys?"
"I suppose I am."
"I hope you'll give me credit for never believing that you were an
ordinary person."
"Yes, I do."
"But _why_ did you do it--masquerade in the Landis farmhouse? I remember
somebody said 'Roland Cary' had 'notions.'"
"I did it to be near a friend--to have a chance to shelter a friend
without attracting notice. A woman--the Other--the one that Charlie
Danton--"
"O-oh! It must have been she Cleborne saw at the window--and I thought
he was warning me about you!"
"I kept her out of harm's way--really in hiding. I didn't know how it
would all end, but it did end perfectly."
"You mean that Madge Yarnell ran away with Charlie Danton, and solved
the problem?"
"Not only that. The very night before _our_ elopement--yours and
mine--she received a letter, a _dear_ letter, from her husband. They'd
been on the point of making it up for weeks. You see, nothing
_impossible_ had occurred."
"I see."
He had put down the lamp so suddenly that the light had flickered out.
The mist was gone, and the velvety blackness stretched unbroken from
shore to shore. Far down the sound, the red rim of the moon was rising
from the water.
"Child," he said, "for a young woman of your position you have married
in a very reckless and off-hand way."
"I knew you were--real. I knew I could trust you."
He gave a short laugh. "Thank you. But if we're going up and down this
weary world in--in this fashion, forever, I think I'll soon begin to
wish that the 'swamper' had put his knife into my heart."
She caught him tenderly by the chin. "Oh, Bob White! If you had never
come back to me--out of that black water!"