They had done enough.

They made up a story, and believed it for all I know.

But I knew the truth, and I would live it down--alone, with myself.

I wasn't going to give in to such a beastly unfair thing.

What did it prove after all?
I was confoundedly cut up.
Sick of life--to tell you the truth; but what would have been the good to shirk it--in--in--that way?
That was not the way.