hot blood dyed her cheek at the thought--with the added shame of being
thought the cast-off mistress of that man's son. Yet all this she had
taken upon herself in expiation of something--she knew not clearly
what; no, for nothing--only for _him_. And yet this very situation
offered her that gleam of hope which had thrilled her; a hope so wild
in its improbability, so degrading in its possibility, that at first
she knew not whether despair was not preferable to its shame. And yet
was it unreasonable? She was no longer passionate; she would be calm
and think it out fairly.

She would go to Low at once. She would find him somewhere--and even if
with that girl, what mattered?--and she would tell him all. When he
knew that the life and death of his father lay in the scale, would he
let his brief, foolish passion for Nellie stand in the way? Even if he
were not influenced by filial affection or mere compassion, would his
pride let him stoop to a rivalry with the man who had deserted his
youth? Could he take Dunn's promised bride, who must have coquetted
with him to have brought him to this miserable plight? Was this like
the calm, proud young god she knew? Yet she had an uneasy instinct that
calm, proud young gods and goddesses did things like this, and felt the
weakness of her reasoning flush her own conscious cheek.

"Teresa!"

She started. Dunn was awake, and was gazing at her curiously.

"I was reckoning it was the only square thing for Low to stop this
promiscuous picnicking here and marry you out and out."

"Marry me!" said Teresa in a voice that, with all her efforts, she
could not make cynical.

"Yes," he repeated, "after I've married Nellie; tote you down to San
Angeles, and there take my name like a man, and give it to you.
Nobody'll ask after _Teresa_, sure--you bet your life. And if they do,
and he can't stop their jaw, just you call on the old man. It's mighty
queer, ain't it, Teresa, to think of you being my daughter-in-law?"

It seemed here as if he was about to lapse again into unconsciousness
over the purely ludicrous aspect of the subject, but he haply recovered
his seriousness. "He'll have as much money from me as he wants to go
into business with. What's his line of business, Teresa?" asked this
prospective father-in-law, in a large, liberal way.

"He is a botanist!" said Teresa, with a sudden childish animation that
seemed to keep up the grim humor of the paternal suggestion; "and oh,
he is too p