Her voice trailed away to monotony. The old man sat staring at her, an odd tremor in his face.
"I swear it shall be destroyed," she continued. "I--I have very great influence over your son; he--he will do what I ask."
"Then why the devil are you giving him up, and your prospects here? They're not to be sneezed at by a woman like you!"
The phrase nettled her. She rose and stood beside him strong and steady.
"Lord Drummuir," she said sarcastically, "I know you to be clever and I thought, being a gentleman, that you might have seen the truth and spared me the pain of that question. I will answer it, however. It is cause your son never loved me. He is very, very fond of me. He has been so ever since we were boy and girl together. And I have been of great use to him. But I could not bring love into his life, and I could not bring him a child. So it did not seem worth while; I could only stand aside."
There was a pause. The old man's face had grown sharp and paler; there was uncertainty even in the cruel lines about the mouth.
"You're rather an extraordinary young woman," he remarked coolly; "might have made your fortune on the stage. Wish I'd met you there!" He grinned. "But now to business. You have the whip hand, of course--I admit that. Now, if I give you--or that fool, my son, it's the same thing--the money for this paper, you promise to make him destroy his counterpart."
"I promise," she replied eagerly. "I can make him do most things----"
"Except love you," interrupted the old man, with a horrible sneer; but the next instant his gouty hand, trembling a little, was outstretched to her in deprecation. "Excuse me, that should not have been said. Well, you know as well as I do that this game is a real confidence trick. You must have heaps of evidence up your sleeve if you chose to bring it forward. But I'll chance that. I haven't seen many of your sort in my life. If I had, I mightn't have been the cursed cripple I am; but I've had a rattlin' good life of it and I don't regret anything--except having begot Pitt. So we will come to terms. I will send the colonelcy money to Marmaduke on condition that he consents to marry within the year. Is that agreed?"
"Agreed," she said firmly.