"No," she said, sullenly. "I won't do that."
"Then there is nothing else you can do," he declared.
Elizabeth mused again. "I would give—money," she said. The last word was spoken very low.
He started and flushed. "Do you want to bribe me?" he asked, angrily.
She shrugged her shoulders. "I am quite aware that you will not do anything for nothing," she said.
Paul fell again to pacing up and down the room. His face showed traces of a mental struggle. Elizabeth watched him from the corners of her eyes; she saw that her offer tempted him more than she had dared to hope.
He stopped at last in front of her. "How much can you spare?" he asked, in a voice in which a certain bravado strove to gain the mastery over inward uneasiness and shame. "The truth is, I am most confoundedly hard up just now, what with furnishing the studio and everything, and if you could help me a little, it would be very convenient. I can pay you back later with interest a hundred times."
"I have told you," she said, coldly, "what payment I want."
He shrugged his shoulders, with an attempt at nonchalance. "Oh, as to that, I never really intended to tell Gerard." Elizabeth's lip curled.
"How much money do you want?" she asked, curtly. "A hundred? Two hundred?" Her ideas on such matters were vague. Paul's face fell.