come--after awhile. But I'd as soon be
dead as go on in this way. Please go on!"

Kate may have been a bit hysterical; at any rate, she really believed
herself utterly indifferent to her sprained ankle and the chance of
freezing. She closed her eyes again and waved Marion away, and Marion
immediately held her closer and patted her shoulder and kissed her
remorsefully.

"Now, don't cry, dear--you'll have me crying in a minute. Be a good
sport and see if you can't walk a little. I'll help you. And once
you're back by the fire, and have your ankle all comfy, and a cup of
hot chocolate, you'll feel heaps better. Hang tight to me, dear, and
I'll help you up."

It was a long walk for a freshly sprained ankle, and the whiteness of
Kate's face stamped deeper into Marion's conscience the guilty sense
of being to blame for it all. She had started in by teasing Kate over
little things, just because Kate was so inquisitive and so lacking in
any sense of humor. She could see now that she had antagonized Kate
where she should have humored her little whims. It wouldn't have done
any harm, Marion reflected penitently, to have confided more in Kate.
She used to tell her everything, and Kate had always been so loyal and
sympathetic.

Penitence of that sort may go to dangerous lengths of confession if
it is not stopped in time. Nothing checked Marion's excited
conscience. The ankle which she bared and bathed was so swollen and
purple that any lurking suspicion of the reality of the hurt vanished,
and Marion cried over it with sheer pity for the torture of that long
walk. Kate's subdued sadness did the rest.

So with Kate, lying on the couch near the fire and with two steaming
cups of chocolate between them on an up-ended box that sturdily did
its duty as a table, Marion let go of her loyalty to one that she
might make amends to another. She told Kate everything she knew about
Jack Corey, down to the exact number of times she had bought
cigarettes and purloined magazines and papers for him. Wherefore the
next hour drew them closer to their old intimacy than they had been
since first they came into the mountains; so close an intimacy that
they called each other dearie while they argued the ethics of Jack's
case and the wisdom--or foolishness--of Marion's championship of the
scapegoat.

"You really should have confided in me long ago--at the very first
inkling you had of his identity," Kate reiterated, sipping her
chocolate as dain