"With a woman, just because she is a woman? As I might love a man because he has all the outward attractions of a man? Have you loved her just for her beauty and despised her mean soul and her vicious mind, and—and despising—still loved?"
She hung upon his words, and when he said "no" her heart sank.
"No—no, I couldn't do that. That would be—horrible!"
He shuddered. She had made Ambrose Sault shudder! Ambrose Sault who spoke calmly of murder, had shuddered at something, which, to him, was worse than murder! The fragrance of sin which had held to her and supported her through the day, was stale and sour and filthy. She shrank away from him, but he held her hands tightly.
"Let me go, please," her voice sounded faint.
"In a moment—look at me, lady."
She raised her eyes to his and they held them.
"I am going to say something to you that I never dreamed I would say; I never thought the words would come to me. Look at me, lady, a rough man—old—I'm more than fifty, ugly, with an old man's shape and an old man's hands. Illiterate—I love you. I shall never see you again—I love you. You are beautiful—the most beautiful lady I have seen. But it isn't that. There is something in you that I love—I don't know what—soul—spirit—individuality. I hope I haven't revolted you—I don't think I have."
"Ambrose!" She clutched at the hands he was drawing away. "I must tell you—there is nothing to love but what you see, there is no soul—no soul—nothing but weakness and a pitiful cowardice. I love a man who is like that, too. Foul, foul! But beautiful to look at—and, Ambrose, I have given him all that he can take."
Not a muscle of his face moved.