The woman's face had suddenly flooded with a radiant happiness, the sight of which caused the man to turn away. In a moment her thankfulness broke out, spasmodic, disjointed, but from the depths of her simple soul.
"You mean that?" she cried. "You mean—oh, may God bless every moment of your life, Leo! Oh, thank God—thank God!"
She suddenly buried her face in her hands, and tears of joy and happiness streamed down her cheeks.
Leo waited for her emotion to pass. He stood gazing out down at the creek. His eyes shone with that peculiar fire which in unguarded moments would not be denied. Then after a few moments the sound of sobs died down, and the man turned.
There was a marked change in him. The fire in his eyes was deep and somber. Audie, glancing into his face, knew that he was deeply stirred. She knew that for the first time in her companionship with him the restraint that was always his had been relaxed. The soul of the man had risen superior to the domination of his will.
"Listen to me, Audie," he cried, in a voice grown suddenly thick with an emotion she had never before witnessed in him. "You said you knew you were merely a passing fancy to me. That's not quite true. It's true I never calculated to marry you. But I liked you. I don't suppose I loved you in the way you would have me love you. No, I liked you, because—you are a woman. Just a woman full of all the extraordinary follies of which some of your sex are capable, but—a woman. It's difficult, but I must tell you. I've always known that the time would come when we must have a straight talk. I have no real love to give to any woman. My whole mind and body are absorbed in another direction, which is utterly opposed to all sentiment. What shall I call it? Ambition? It's scarcely the word. It's more than that. It's a passion." His eyes shone with deep feeling. "A passion that's greater than any love man ever gave to woman."
"Yes, all my life I've fostered it," he went on abstractedly, "from away back in the days of early boyhood. God knows where I got it from. My father and mother were respectable, dozy, middle-class folks in New England, without a thought beyond the doings of their little town. They had no ambition. Their life drove me frantic. I must get out and do. I must take my place in the battle of life, and win my way to the forefront among the ranks of our country's millionaires. That is the passionate dream of my life which I intend to achieve. That is the wild ambition that has eaten into my very bones. It is part of me. It is me. It is a driving force which I have created in myself—and now it is beyond my control. I am the slave of my self-created passion, as surely as any drug fiend is a slave to the wiles of his torturer. I could not defy its will if I desired to. But I do not desire to. Do you understand me? Do you understand when I say I have no love to give to any woman? I am eaten up with this passion which leaves no room in mind or heart for any other.
"Maybe you think me a heartless brute," he continued after a moment's pause, "without feeling, or sympathy. Perhaps you're right. Maybe I am. I don't know. Nor do I care. I doubt if you can possibly understand me. I don't understand myself. All I know is, nothing I can remove will ever stand in the way of my achievement. I have no real scruples, and I want you to know all this now—now with our whole futures lying before us. This problem is not as difficult as you seem to think. There is no particular reason why I should not marry you. On the contrary there is every reason why I should. I have had a good year, so good that it might astonish you if you knew the amount of gold I have taken out of the creek. We shall go down to the coast with twice the amount Tug possesses. Tug never knew how well I was doing."
He smiled faintly.
"However," he hastened on, "my plan had been to leave here next spring, to avoid the winter journey, that was all. There will be no work done all the coming winter. So what does it matter if we make the journey six months earlier? It will help you, and does not hurt me. So—don't worry yourself any more about it, but just make your preparations for departure this day week."