“Yes.”
Perhaps her fresh youthful beauty moved him, perhaps it was merely opposition that raised his love suddenly to the dignity of a passion that made him for once forget himself, his clothes, his personal appearance, and the gentlemanly modulation of his voice.
For a moment he was almost a man. He almost touched the height of a man's ascendency over woman.
“You may say No now,” he cried, “but I shall have you yet. Some day you will say Yes.”
It was then for the first time that Dora realised that this man did actually love her according to his lights. But never for an instant did she admit in her own mind the possibility of succumbing to Arthur's will. It is not by words that men command women. They must first command their respect, and that is never gained by words.
Dora was conscious of a feeling of sudden, unspeakable pain. Arthur had only succeeded in convincing her that she could have submitted to a man's will, wholly and without reserve; but not to the will of Arthur Agar. He had only showed her that such a submission would in itself have been a greater happiness than she had ever tasted. But she knew at once that only one man ever had, ever could have had, the power of exacting such submission; and he commanded it, not by word of mouth (for he never seemed to ask it), but by something strong and just and good within himself, before which her whole being bowed down.
We never know how we appear in the eyes of our neighbours, friends or lovers. Arthur was at that moment in Dora's eyes a mere sham, aping something he could never attain.
He had seized her two hands in his nervous and delicate fingers, from which she easily withdrew them. The action was natural enough, strong enough. But he completely spoiled the effect by the words he spoke in his thin tenor voice.
“No, Arthur,” she said. “No, Arthur; since you mention the future, I may as well tell you now that my answer will never be anything but No. At one time I thought that it might be different. I told my mother that possibly, after a great many years, I might think otherwise; but I retract that. I shall never think otherwise. And if you imagine that you can force me to do so, please lay aside that hope at once.”
“Then there is some one else!” cried Arthur, with an apparent irrelevance. “I know there is some one else.”