"How can I trust a man who deliberately tells me that he holds a secret and a document over a woman's head?" demanded Nesta. "You've admitted a previous hold on my mother. You say you're in possession of a secret that would ruin her—quite apart from recent events. Is that honest?"
"It was none of my seeking," retorted Pratt. "I gained the knowledge by accident."
"You're giving yourself away," said Nesta. "Or you've some mental twist or defect which prevents you from seeing things straight. It's not how you got your knowledge, but the use you're making of it that's the important thing! You're using it to force my mother to——"
"Excuse me!" interrupted Pratt with a queer smile. "It's you who don't see things straight. I'm using my knowledge to protect—all of you. Let your mind go back to what was said at first—to what I said at first. I said that I'd discovered a secret which, if revealed, would ruin your mother and injure—you! So it would—more than ever, now. So, you see, in keeping it, I'm taking care, not only of her interests, but of—yours!"
Nesta rose. She realized that there was no more to be said—or done. And
Pratt rose, too, and looked at her almost appealingly.
"I wish you'd try to see things as I've put them, Miss Mallathorpe," he said. "I don't bear malice against your mother for that scheme she contrived—I'm willing to put it clear out of my head. Why not accept things as they are? I'll keep that secret for ever—no one shall ever know about it. Why not be friends, now—why not shake hands?"
He held out his hand as he spoke. But Nesta drew back.
"No!" she said. "My opinion is just what it was when I came here."
Before Pratt could move she had turned swiftly to the door and let herself out, and in another minute she was amongst the crowds in the street below. For a few minutes she walked in the direction of Robson's offices, but when she had nearly reached them, she turned, and went deliberately to those of Eldrick & Pascoe.