"Don't worry, Doris," he said, taking her in his arms. "I wouldn't be so cruel. I only wanted to hear you say it."
"But I did—I will—if you ask it," she said quickly.
He shook his head.
"If you'd only said it differently. Don't mind me—I'm an idiot—and you don't understand."
What he meant was that he was an idiot, when he was getting so much that other men coveted, to insist on what was not in her charming, facile self to give him. An hour later, after an interview with Daniel Drake, he was ready to wonder what had made him flare up so quickly—Boskirk's presence perhaps, or something impulsive which had awakened within him when Drina had flushed while describing her distinct ideas upon the subject of the sentiments.
But a new exhilaration effectively drove away all other emotions—the delirious appetite for gain which had come irresistibly and tyrannically into his life with the dramatic intensity of his first speculation. In the interim in Daniel Drake's library, with Doris perched excitedly on the arm of his chair, several things had been decided. A great operation was under way which promised an unusual profit. Bojo was to place $50,000 in the pool which was to be used to operate in the stocks of a certain Southern railroad long suspected to be on the verge of a receivership, at the end of which campaign he was to enter Mr. Drake's service in the rôle of a private secretary.
Meanwhile he was to continue in the employ of Hauk, Flaspoller and Forshay, the better to figure in the mixed scheme of manipulation which would be necessary. He was so seized with the drama of the opportunity, so keen over the thought of being once more a part of all the whirling, hurtling machinery of speculation that he did not remember even for a passing thought, the horror which had come over him at his first incredible success.