The old servant I had seen on my first visit was delighted as well as relieved at our advent, but looked strangely at Wilfred, and at my request silently opened the door of a room, and left us together.
I did this because, as I descended from the carriage, Ruth said:
"Say what you must say to him quickly, Roger, I cannot bear for him to be in the house. I cannot bear to see him again!"
And so he and I stood alone in the room into which we had been ushered, and in the flickering light I saw that his face was pale as death.
"You have won again," he said between his set teeth.
"Be thankful I have won, Wilfred," I said. "Supposing it had been otherwise, and you had succeeded in your designs. Would you have been any happier? Would you not have been haunted with the thought that you had ruined her life, besides condemning her to the hell of a loveless marriage?"
"And would I have cared for that?" he retorted, "My chief thought was to baulk you, to crush you, as the younger brother should crush the elder, when the elder has been unworthy of his name. To do this I would suffer hell, here and hereafter; to do this I would allow myself to be buffeted, scorned, hated; I would be as I have been, the vile plotter and cunning villain. And why? I hate you, partly because you have stepped into the place I longed for, but more because my mother taught me to do so. Ay, and I will hate you, and I will curse you."
"Wilfred," I said, "do not goad me too far. I wish you no harm; nay, I only wish you good. I have in the past sacrificed much for you; but if you plot against Ruth again, or if you lift a finger against her, I shall be obliged to crush you as I would an adder, not because I hate you, but because I care for others."
"And that's your love for me, is it?" he sneered.
"Yes, it is my love," I answered; "for I will not allow you to be more a devil than you are while I can prevent it. Remember, Wilfred, there is a law in England, and to that law I will appeal, and if that law will not give me justice, then, Wilfred, you know me, I will take you in hand, and I will lock you up as a fiend, a moral madman, that should not be at large. I will imprison you as I would a mad dog. I want no revenge, for I have no wish for it in my heart, although God only knows what I should have felt had you succeeded in your designs to-night. As it is, I only tell you to beware."