"Perhaps you have given your love elsewhere," he sneers. "Rumor assigns Colonel Lockhart the highest place in your favor."
"Rumor is right," Lady Vera answers, with calm defiance. "I love Colonel Lockhart, and I should have been his wife had not you reappeared upon the scene. I believed you dead. Tell me who was it that died last year in your native city, having the same name as your own?"
"It was my uncle, Leslie Noble, for whom I was named," he answers, sullenly, and then, quite suddenly, he falls down on his knees before her, and tries to take her hand, but she draws it haughtily away.
"Oh, Vera," he exclaims, in abject despair, "you drive me mad when you so heartlessly declare your love for another man. You have no right to love any other man than me; I am the lord of your heart and person, yet once more I plead with you, humbly, because I love you, come home with me, Vera, my darling. Be my wife in truth. Let me claim what already belongs to me in the eyes of the law."
"Never!" she answers, decisively. "Rise, Leslie Noble, do not kneel to me. I will have naught to do with you now or ever. I would die before I would recognize your claim upon me. You have my answer now and for all time. Go, and do not trouble me again."
She moves to the door and holds it open, pointing to it with one white, taper finger. She looks so proud, so imperious, so commanding, that against his will he is compelled to obedience.
He moves to the door, but looks back to say with a dark, menacing frown:
"I am going, but do not please yourself with the fancy that you have seen the last of me, Lady Fairvale. You belong to me, and I swear that I will have my own."
With that ominous threat he goes.