"Sudden! After all these months!" He pauses. "Is it to be Dunkerton or me?" asks he violently.
"Please do not bring Lord Dunkerton into this discussion," says she coldly.
"I certainly shall."
"You mean that I——"
"Have encouraged him. So I hear, at all events, and—there are things I remember."
"For the matter of that," says she, throwing up her beautiful head, "there are things I remember too! You—you dare to come here and accuse me of falsity when I have watched you all day making steady court to that wretched little plebeian, playing tennis with her all the day long, and far into the evening! No! I may have said half a dozen words to Lord Dunkerton, but you—how many half-dozen words have you said to Miss Bolton? Come, answer me that, as we seem bent on riddles."
"All this is as nothing," says Rylton. "You know, as well as I do, that Miss Bolton has not a thought of mine! I want only one thing, the assurance that you love me, and I put it at marriage. Will you link your fate with mine, low down though it is at present? If you will, Marian"—he comes closer to her and lays his hands upon her shoulders, and gazes at her with eyes full filled with honest love—"I shall work for you to the last day of my life. If you will not——"
He pauses—he looks at her—he waits. But no answer comes from her.
"Marian, take courage," says he softly—very softly. "My darling, is money everything?"
She suddenly leans back from him, and looks fair in his eyes.