Mary Cresswell walked slowly on, flushing and paling by turns. Could it
be that this Negro had dared to misunderstand her--had presumed? She
reviewed her conduct. Perhaps she had been indiscreet in thus making a
confidant of him in her trouble. She had thought of him as a boy--an old
student, a sort of confidential servant; but what had he thought? She
remembered Miss Smith's warning of years before--and he had been North
since and acquired Northern notions of freedom and equality. She bit her
lip cruelly.
Yet, she mused, she was herself to blame. She had unwittingly made the
intimacy and he was but a Negro, looking on every white woman as a
goddess and ready to fawn at the slightest encouragement. There had been
no one else here to confide in. She could not tell Miss Smith her
troubles, although she knew Miss Smith must suspect. Harry Cresswell,
apparently, had written nothing home of their quarrel. All the neighbors
behaved as if her excuse of ill-health were sufficient to account for
her return South to escape the rigors of a Northern winter. Alwyn, and
Alwyn alone, really knew. Well, it was her blindness, and she must right
it quietly and quickly with hard ruthless plainness. She blushed again
at the shame of it; then she began to excuse.
After all, which was worse--a Cresswell or an Alwyn? It was no sin that
Alwyn had done; it was simply ignorant presumption, and she must correct
him firmly, but gently, like a child.
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