"Yes," said Meg bravely. "I did mean it. I meant every word. And you swore that nothing should ever tempt you to try to help me again, and you meant it. And yet I ask you. Give me the diamonds now, for they are the price of his life. Nothing that I could say if I begged on my knees, though I will do that if you like, could be stronger than this. I do remember, and yet I ask you."
He turned his head away, not caring to look at her. Was this Margaret? Ah, yes! No other woman could so have moved him—"I remember—and yet I ask you—even you," was what she meant; she was proud even in her self-abasement.
"You will?" she said.
"No!" he answered gravely. "I am sorry. I warned you not to ask me. One can't say such a 'no' so that it does not give pain, or I would. I don't want to be more of a brute to you than I need. I would say it gently if I could—but I cannot—I mean I will not—give you that."
He twisted his eyeglass cord rapidly round his finger, as she remembered his doing of old, when he was a trifle excited in an argument. Then he made a mistake. He should have left his refusal there; but he did not; he began to justify himself; he could not bear that she should think him worse than he was.
"I should like to say that it is not because of what passed between us outside the governor's house that I refuse your request now," he said. "I am not quite mean enough to revenge myself on you for that—I should not have given the diamonds up in any case."
"Why not?" said Meg.
He shrugged his shoulders again.
"Because I am not quixotic," he said. "You mustn't expect a man to belie his nature. Look here, Mrs. Thorpe. You always knew me to be a fellow with what you and your father called 'low aims,' didn't you? That was what you didn't like about me years ago. Oh, you never said so; and you were too good to despise any one; but you thought me on a different level; and I lost you; and Barnabas Thorpe married you. Very well! I had no right to complain; but, then, you mustn't expect me to be high-minded now."
"If I offended you then——" began Meg in a low voice; but he stopped her.