Spurrier knew that the jaws of the trap were closing on him. He had been too hasty in his outburst 268 and he turned toward the door, but as his hand fell on the bronze knob Harrison spoke again.
“Think it over, Spurrier. I can—and will ruin you—unless you yield. It is no time for maudlin sentiment, but until five-thirty this afternoon, I shall not consider your answer final. Up to that hour you may reconsider it, if you wish.”
“I will notify you at five,” responded the lieutenant as he let himself out and closed the door behind him.
That day the opportunity hound spent in an agony of conflicting emotions. That the other held a bolt of destruction and was in the mood to launch it he did not pretend to doubt. If it were launched even the land upon which his cottage stood would no longer be his own. He must either return to Glory empty-handed and bankrupt, or strain with a new tax, the confidence he had asked of her, with the pledge that he would return soon and for good.
But if, even at the cost of humbled pride and Glory’s hurt, he maintained his business relations, the path to eventual success remained open.
As long as the cards were being shuffled chance beckoned and at five o’clock Spurrier went into a cigar-store booth and called a downtown telephone number.
“You hold the whip hand, sir,” he announced curtly when a secretary had put Harrison on the wire. “When do I report for final instructions?”
“Come to my house this evening,” ordered the master.
Most of the hours of that evening, except the two in Harrison’s study, Spurrier spent in writing to Glory, tearing up letter after letter while the nervous moisture 269 bedewed his brow. It was so impossible to give her any true or comprehensive explanation of the pressing weight of compulsion. His messages must have the limp of unreason. He was crossing the ocean without her and she would read into it a sort of abandonment that would hurt and wound her. He had taxed everything else in life, and now he was overtaxing her loyalty.
Yet he believed that if in his depleted treasury of life there was one thing left upon which he could draw prodigally and with faith, it was that love; a love that would stand staunch though he were forced to hurt it once again.