tty's face and made
her pretty mouth harden roused Jack MacRae to an intolerable fury. It
was like a knife in a tender spot. He had been stifling the impulse to
forget and bury all these ancient wrongs and injustices for which
neither of them was responsible but for which, so far as he could see,
they must both suffer. Something cracked in him at Betty's words. She
jumped, warned by the sudden blaze in his eyes. But he caught her with a
movement quicker than her own. He held her by the arms with fingers that
gripped like iron clamps. He shook her.

"You wonder if I really care," he cried. "My God, can't you see? Can't
you feel? Must a man grovel and weep and rave?"

Betty whitened a little at this storm which she had evoked. But she did
not flinch. Her eyes looked straight into his, fearlessly.

"You are raving now," she said. "And you are hurting my arms terribly."

MacRae released his hold on her. His hands dropped to his sides.

"I suppose I was," he said in a flat, lifeless tone. "But don't say that
to me again, ever. You can say anything you like, Betty, except that I'm
not in earnest. I don't deserve that."

Betty retreated a little. MacRae was not even looking at her now. His
eyes were turned to the sea, to hide the blur that crept into them in
spite of his will.

"You don't deserve anything," Betty said distinctly. She moved warily
away as she spoke. "You have the physical courage to face death; but you
haven't the moral courage to face a problem in living, even though you
love me. You take it for granted that I'm as weak as you are. You won't
even give me a chance to prove whether love is strong or weak in the
face of trouble. And I will never give you another chance--never."

She sprang from the beach to the low pile of driftwood and from that
plunged into the thicket. MacRae did not try to follow. He did not even
move. He looked after her a minute. Then he sat down on the log again
and stared at the steady march of the swells. There was a sense of
finality in this thing which made him flounder desperately. Still, he
assured himself, it had to be. And if it had to be that way it was
better to have it so understood. Betty would never look at him again
with that disturbing message in her eyes. He would not be troubled by a
futile longing. But it hurt. He had never imagined how so abstract a
thing as emotion could breed such an ache in a man's heart.

After a little he got up. There was a trail behind th