"Money! I would give—God knows what I would give."
"I do not believe he will come," said Brett, assuming a confidence he did not feel. "He must know that the house is watched already."
Marion's expression changed. Her face turned paler. The lines deepened and her eyes grew dark. She had made a desperate resolution. She took Brett's hand and looked at him in silence for a moment.
"Good-bye—dear," she said.
She would have withdrawn her hand, but Brett grasped it and pressed it almost roughly to his lips.
"Good-bye," she said again.
It was almost too much to ask of any man. Brett held her hand fast.
"No—not good-bye," he answered with rising passion. "It is not possible. It cannot be, Marion—do not say it."
"I must—you must."
"No—no—no!" he repeated. "It cannot be good-bye. Remember what you said. Is this man who was dead to you and to all the world, if not to me, to ruin both our lives? Are we to bow our heads and submit patiently to such a fate as that? If I had told you long ago that he was alive, as I alone knew he was, would you not have done your best to free yourself from such a tie, from a man—you said it yourself—whose very name is a stain, and whose mere memory is a disgrace?"