p sister's thumb. If you'll run
down to old Peter Ferrara's house and tell him what has happened, and
then go home yourself, we'll call it square."

"I have already done that," Betty said. "Dolly is away. The fishermen
are bringing Steve Ferrara's body to his uncle's house. They are going
to try to save what is left of your boat."

"It is kind of you, I'm sure, to pick up the pieces," MacRae gibed.

"I _am_ sorry," the girl breathed.

"After the fact. Belting around a point in the dark at train speed,
regardless of the rules of the road. Destroying a valuable boat, killing
a man. Property is supposed to be sacred--if life has no market value.
Were you late for dinner?"

In his anger he made a quick movement with his arms, flinging the
blanket off, sending intolerable pangs through his bruised and torn
body.

Betty rose and bent over him, put the blanket back silently, tucked him
in like a mother settling the cover about a restless child. She did not
say anything for a minute. She stood over him, nervously plucking bits
of lint off the blanket. Her eyes grew wet.

"I don't blame you for feeling that way," she said at last. "It was a
terrible thing. You had the right of way. I don't know why or how
Robertson let it happen. He has always been a careful navigator. The
nearness when he saw you under his bows must have paralyzed him, and
with our speed--oh, it isn't any use, I know, to tell you how sorry I
am. That won't bring that poor boy back to life again. It won't--"

"You killed him--your kind of people--twice," MacRae said thickly. "Once
in France, where he risked his life--all he had to risk--so that you and
your kind should continue to have ease and security. He came home
wheezing and strangling, suffering all the pains of death without
death's relief. And when he was beginning to think he had another chance
you finish him off. But that's nothing. A mere incident. Why should you
care? The country is full of Ferraras. What do they matter? Men of no
social or financial standing, men who work with their hands and smell of
fish. If it's a shock to you to see one man dead and another cut and
bloody, think of the numbers that suffer as great pains and hardships
that you know nothing about--and wouldn't care if you did. You couldn't
be what you are and have what you have if they didn't. Sorry! Sympathy
is the cheapest thing in the market, cheaper than salmon. You can't help
Steve Ferrara with that--not now. Don't w