“It’s the truth.”
He laughed again. “Of course I can’t prove that I’m not—any more than you can prove that I am.... And meantime I love you very much indeed and am asking you to be my wife.... Now don’t refuse offhand. Take time to consider.... You don’t want to be shut up in your room for months, maybe years. Your father seemed to have the notion of imprisonment for life.” He showed his teeth in a smile that seemed to say he appreciated the humor of the whole thing. “I offer you a way out, and not a hard way.... You can’t dislike me so much, or you wouldn’t have been willing to play around with me the way you have. Just think it over and you’ll see lots of advantages.... Why, we can end this disagreeable situation this afternoon! Throw a few things in a bag and come with me. We’ll be married and telephone your father. He’ll rage, but you’ll be out of his reach.”
She sat silent, bewildered, more terrified by this new development than by her father’s rage and her imprisonment. She was afraid of Cantor’s suavity; she was afraid of his power, afraid of what he and her father might plan and carry through with her as its victim. It was sinister, threatening.... And what she knew of this man did not lead her to think of him as a man who married.... As she was she might lose her life or her reason, but something told her that if she became Cantor’s she would lose her soul.... Potter Waite arose before her, and her love for Potter Waite—her love that could never come to fruition....
She pondered, and her keen, restless brain darted here and there like some small imprisoned animal seeking a way of escape, but everywhere encountering the bars of the cage.... One thing she saw—she must not refuse Cantor with finality. She must leave him uncertain, with hope or reason to believe he might find her malleable in his hands. She must not offend him; she must put him off from day to day for her own safety, hoping for the unexpected to intervene. They hoped to shut her mouth by marriage. She would hold them in suspense and gain what advantage a moment might vouchsafe to her. At any rate, Cantor meant liberties for her; meant that she would be allowed to leave her room, to go about the city with him, to divert herself, to find relief in gaieties and in matching her wits against his.... This she saw.
“Not now—not to-day,” she said. “Wait.... This is a new thought to me.... I don’t know.... Will you go now and let me think. Please go now—and come to-morrow.”
“For my answer?”
“I won’t promise that—but come.”
He lifted her hand to his lips. “To hear is to obey,” he said, gaily. “At least I may hope.”
She found herself alone and tired, so tired. “You can hope,” she said to the vanished Cantor, “but there’s no hope for me—in all the world there’s not a ray of hope.”