"Well, that is just what we are going to do—to save the state from the Republicans."
"Well?"
"And Blake is going to work up the campaign for me—on the condition—"
My blood was pounding like fire through my veins, but I felt absolutely unable to move. I knew what he was going to say and my heart was pleading for mercy, but my lips were mute. They could not even move enough to say, "I know it all. Don't say the hideous words." Richard had grown painfully embarrassed, and he stammered awkwardly:
"—on the condition that I become his son-in-law."
Just what happened after this I do not know. I might sit here all night trying to recall his explanations and protestations, but I shall get through with it all as speedily as possible, for all I really remember about that terrible day is that I felt dreadfully ill—and benumbed. I listened in a sort of trance to his recital of how Berenice Blake had labored under an hallucination for some time that he cared for her; and she had learned to return the fancied affection; how very ill she was, so ill that when she came home for Thanksgiving it was found that she would have to go right back to Denver—
"And you went as far as St. Louis with them—and brought me a string of pearls," I said in a dazed fashion.
"Yes, I always think of you first—no matter where I am," he answered, looking at me fondly. "And our love-affair will not even be suspended for very long," he went on. "She can't possibly live six months; and her father wants, above everything on earth, that she shall be happy for the little while that she has to live."
"By marrying you."
"By being engaged to me. I would not marry her—there is no necessity for that."