“Ned! You can’t! After all our plans. I won’t hear of it——”
“Wait, dearest!” the man pleaded. “Of course I won’t go if you say not——”
“Of course I say not——”
“But it’s a real opportunity—to make forty or fifty thousand. Wait till I tell you about it, anyway.”
He told her simply: the exact plan that his father had proposed. Her interest quickened as he talked. She had a proper respect for wealth, and the idea of the large profits went home speedily and surely to her imagination, shutting out for the moment all other aspects of the affair. And soon she found herself sitting erect, listening keenly to his every word.
The idea of trading obsolete gowns for beautiful furs was particularly attractive to her. “I’ve got some old things I could spare,” she told him eagerly. “Why couldn’t you take those with you and trade them to some old squaw for furs?”
“I could! I don’t see why I shouldn’t bring you back some beauties.”
Her eyes were suddenly lustful. “I’d like some silver fox—and enough sable for a great wrap. Oh, Ned—do you think you could get them for me?”
His face seemed rather drawn and mirthless as he returned her stare. It had been too complete a victory. It can be said for the man that he had come with the idea of persuading Lenore to let him go, to let him leave her arms for the sake of the advantages to be accrued from the expedition, but at least he wanted her to show some regret. He didn’t entirely relish her sudden, unbounded enthusiasm, and the avaricious gleam in her eyes depressed and estranged him.
But Lenore made no response to his darkened mood. Sensitive as she usually was, she seemed untouched by it, wholly unaware of his displeasure. She was thinking of silver fox, and the thought was as fascinating as that of gold to a miser. And now her mind was reaching farther, moving in a greater orbit, and for the moment she sat almost breathless. Suddenly she turned to him with shining eyes.