"It was because I ceased to respect you! How could I respect a man who
would allow a wild ignorant creature to caress his hands and hang upon
his words?"
He turned a face of pure bewilderment upon her. "If you mean the
Algonquin girl, Wanda," he said, "she has never treated me otherwise
than with indifference, anger and contempt." He explained the scene of
which Helene had been an involuntary witness, and the proud girl felt
humiliated and belittled. But he was too generous and perhaps too
clever to allow her to suppose that he attributed her coldness to weak
jealousy. That would have placed her at a disadvantage which her pride
would never have forgiven.
"So you believed me to be a vain contemptible idiot," he said, "Then
you did perfectly right to scorn me." He drove on furiously, with
tense lips and contracted brow. She had misjudged him cruelly, but he
would not descend to harsh accusation. Helene was decidedly
uncomfortable. "I have never scorned you," she said. "It was because
I believed you superior to the folly and weakness of ordinary men that
it grieved me to think you were otherwise.
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