He lighted his pipe, and Weekes laughed.
"Well, well, you're a smart man, I find. I'll give you that credit. You see pretty far through a millstone—eh? If you won't knock under to me, then we'll start again, and put it on a business footing. I want no misunderstanding with you. This girl thinks she's fond of you for the moment. I'll grant that much. But you'll see, if you really care a button about her, that her prosperity would be a good deal surer with me than with you. You needn't be angry at all. This is a matter of business. I want her. I've known her—long, long before ever you did; and if you hadn't turned up from God knows where, she'd have come to me right and proper when I decided I was ready for her. I am ready for her now. If I'd asked her a month sooner, she'd have come without question, of course; but meanwhile she had seen you, and was taken, like a child, with your size. So it stands. I grant that you've got the whip hand for the minute. You have me in your power up to any reasonable sum. It lies in a nutshell, Daniel Brendon. What's your figure?"
"For chucking her?"
"For leaving her alone to come to her senses. Money's not got every day; a wife can be. If you want the last, there's no better way to get 'em than with the first."
"Yet Sarah Jane put me afore your cash seemingly?"
"Like any foolish girl might in a rash moment. But you're not a fool, or I'm no judge of character. You're a man of ideas and ambitions. I thought you were a common labourer. That's what made me rather savage. I see you're a man as good as myself—every bit. So I'll forgive Sarah that much, and appeal to your sense of justice to give me back my own. And since I know well enough you will be making a great sacrifice, I offer you an equivalent."
Daniel listened.
"A generous chap you are, then?"
"Yes, I am. I don't want to exert force, or trust to my position. I meet you man to man equal. I've long been as good as tokened to her, and it would be a very wicked thing for you to come between us. I'll not say you have no rights, however; I'll not say that a silly woman's passing whim isn't to count. I'll grant everything—everything in reason. I'll allow that you won her fair and square, though she didn't tell you quite the truth, I'm afraid. I'll allow that for the moment she honestly thinks that she loves you better than she loves me. But, beyond all that, there's these two points. I'll offer you good money to drop this, as in justice to me you should do at once; and I'll say that if you want Sarah Jane to be happy and content and prosperous, you must see that I'm the man to make her so—not you."
"That's your side, then?"