"You! you! Why is my reputation your affair?"
Instead of answering, he knelt down on the bearskin hearth-rug, and leaned forward until their eyes were on a level.
"Look at me, Flash—straight! That's a good girl. Now, tell me this. I've met Ingram once. If I were to know everything as, say, for argument's sake, God knows it, is there any reason I shouldn't like to meet him again?"
"You'll—never—know."
Of all the answers she could have made him, it was probably the one for which he was least prepared. He jumped to his feet and stood, baffled, pulling at his moustache and looking down on the floor. Then he threw up his head.
"So be it," he said. "I'll take that risk with the others. Flash, will you have me?"
She curled her lip.
"Oh! quite respectably. A man with his shirt outside his coat shall say those few words first that mean so much."
"No, Bryan. I won't."
"Don't be a little donkey, Flash. You don't realize what you're throwing away. You don't know what a man like me is prepared to do, once he's hard hit. Don't believe all the tales you hear. My heart's been burgled, but it's never been raided before. You are the first, in a way. I'll be gentle—I'll be respectful—I'll be as like the men in the novels girls read as I can. I know my faults. Haven't I been holding myself in all the time? It's not as if I wanted you to give up anything. You can live your own life, till you've tired of it. I ain't"—he laughed shortly—"jealous of the public. And as for the man you won't tell me about, you see I'm putting him out of the question. He's gone, anyhow. And oh, Flash! I'll make your life a fairy tale come true. Think of the dresses you'll have. I'll never be tired of seeing you in new ones. And the travelling! We'll go all over the earth. If you've got those new ideas, I'll settle money on you in a lump. Then you won't feel bad asking me for it. I'll leave everything to your own generosity. Could I say fairer? Could I offer more? Oh, why don't you say something? How can you sit there and listen to me, talking like some rotten old drysalting coronation knight?"