"No," he answered, roughly; "I don't understand gratitude! Love and hate I know, and scorn, and even now and then, in weak moments, something like regret. But that last is waste of time; and as to gratitude—why should one be grateful? No man does more for another than he feels inclined to. Some people enjoy giving up things and being unselfish and denying themselves and so on. I don't. I have never yet met the man or woman who, in my opinion, was worth the slightest sacrifice from me, and I don't suppose I ever shall. Don't turn from me in such disgust, Miss Grahame. Most people think as I do, but fear of others make them hold their tongue about it and pose as being fond of doing good and all that sort of humbug. Now I am not like that."
"No," she returned; "I see you are not. You like to boast of your evil qualities as though you were proud of them; and you think it a fine thing to utter bitter and uncalled-for jests at the expense of others, under the pretence of loving truth."
"Miss Grahame," he said, suddenly seizing her gloved hands and turning her face to the light, "what makes you hate me as you do? It sounds in your voice, which vibrates with dislike; you shrink back from my touch as though I were a viper; you can't even look me in the face; and your scorn breaks out in every word you utter. What possible harm have I ever done you that you should hate me as you do?"
His fierce pressure of her hands hurt her, and the very touch of his fingers had the effect of making her tingle from head to foot with aversion. A desire, which was almost hysterical in its intensity, came upon Laline to answer him back the truth, and cry,—
"I hate you because you are my husband, because you won me by a cruel and heartless trick, because I understand your nature and my own revolts against it, and because you stand between me and the man I love with all my heart and soul!"
"Why won't you look at me?" he was asking. "Is my appearance so loathsome that you daren't even do that? Look in my eyes, and you will read there whether, if I had Lorin's chance, I could not love you a thousand times better than he is capable of doing. Love! He doesn't know what it means. How can a man with beautiful manners and beautiful clothes, a man who paints pretty pictures and plays tennis with pretty girls, a man of flawless character with his pockets full of money and his future nicely garden-rolled before him, know of the passion that burns in the veins of a friendless scamp such as I? Your good men who go to church on Sunday and stick to their desks so many hours on weekdays don't know the meaning of the word passion. Lorin has everything in life—why should he want you too? Good women like you are sent into the world to redeem bad men like me, not to carve beef and mutton for such estimable citizens as my cousin Lorin. A good woman whom I loved and who loved me might do what she liked with me; and, Lina, from the moment when yesterday you ran into my arms, I have loved you and longed to hold you there again!"
"You must be mad!" she exclaimed, struggling to free her hands from his grasp. "If you were in your right senses you would not dare to speak to me like this! I have only once before seen you—I have no feeling for you but contempt and dislike—and yet you talk to me of love! Let my hands go this instant, and never presume to so insult me again!"
She was looking him full in the face this time, with mingled terror and aversion shining in her soft, dark eyes. As he met their gaze, Wallace Armstrong suddenly dropped his hands and fell back a step with a muttered expletive—
"What a likeness!" he ejaculated, and continued staring fixedly at Laline.