He had deliberately thought out the falsehood that protected Lucille Masterson at his own expense. But it was harder than he had anticipated to play this weak rôle before Elsie Murray.
"Yes," he forced the difficult acknowledgment.
"You need not have told me that," her slow reply crossed the darkness to him. "I know it is not true. And I know what is true. It does not matter how I—learned. But we may as well speak honestly."
He could have cried out in his great relief. Instead, he seized the offered privilege of speech.
"I will, then! You know what I have done to Fred Masterson. I brought the glamour of money, of what I could buy, into his household and made his wife awake to discontent and ambition. I didn't know what mischief I was working, until too late. I did not understand some of it until last night. Now, what? Suppose I go away? Where can I go? Abroad, or on a hunting trip? While I was gone she would get the divorce, when I came back she and the rest would push me into the marriage. My own father is pushing me. Everyone pities her and thinks the thing is suitable. You don't know me! I like her, and I'm easily pushed. I tell you I never did anything but drift, until last night. I am afraid of myself, yet."
"Then, why have you sent for me?" she asked, after a silence.
There was as much sullenness as resolution in the unconscious gesture with which he folded his arms.
"Because I mean to stop this thing. Because I am going to take my own way for the rest of the journey instead of being pushed and pulled. I quit, to-night."
"How? What do you mean?"
"I am leaving the position where I am not strong enough to stand firm. And because I know myself, I am fixing it so I cannot go back. You"—he stumbled over the word—"you are not much better off than I, so far as getting what you want out of life is concerned. Do you want—will you try the venture with me? I think, I'm sure I could keep my half of a home. You once said you would like to be a poor man's wife——"