Gouldesbrough smiled sadly.
"It is as Marjorie wishes," he said. "But I know that Marjorie knows she can trust me."
The great man saw that once more the girl lifted her eyes and looked at him with something which was almost like reverence. Never before had he seen her look at him like this. Once more the evil joy in the possibility of victory after all leapt through his blood.
No thought nor realization of the terrible thing he had done, of the horrors that he and the pink-faced man in Regent's Park were even now perfecting, came to trouble that moment of evil pride. Everybody had always said, everybody who had been brought into contact with him, always knew that Sir William Gouldesbrough was a strong man!
Lady Poole waited a moment to see if her daughter made any sign of wishing her to remain, and finding that there was none, for Marjorie was standing with drooping head and made no movement, the dowager swept out of the room with rustling skirts, and gently closed the door.
Sir William and Marjorie were left alone.
The man of action asserted himself.
"Sit down, Marjorie," he said in a commonplace tone, "and just let me talk to you on pure matters of fact. Now, my dear, we haven't seen each other since you wrote me the letter telling me that our engagement was a mistake. You know what my reply to that was, and I believe and trust you know that I shall remain perfectly true to both the spirit and actual words of that communication. That's all we need say now, except just this: I loved you dearly and I love you dearly now. I had hoped that we might have been very happy together and that I might have spent my life in your service. But that was not to be in the way that I had hoped. At the same time, I am not a man easily moved or changed, and if I cannot be yours in one way, dear girl, I will be yours in another. However, that's all about that. Now, then, let me tell you how hard I have been trying to discover the truth of this astounding disappearance of poor Mr. Guy Rathbone."
A low sob came from the girl in the chair. It was a sob not only of regret for her lost lover, but it had the same note of reverence, of utter appreciation, of her first words.
"You are too good," she said. "William, I have treated you horribly badly. You are too good. Oh, you are too good!"