"Mad if you like," said Rackham. "After all, I am Barnaby's cousin, and it's probably in our blood. Look at him, still crazed over a woman who jilted him years ago!"
She flung up her head, compelled by a piteous instinct to play her part.
"And I am Barnaby's wife," she said bravely.
He looked at her fixedly, making no motion to let her pass him.
"Are you?" he said.
The band seemed to burst into clamour and die away; but they were all dancing; there must be music still, although she could not hear anything but these two syllables. She kept her eyes steady. Perhaps he did not grasp the significance of his words.
"You have insulted me enough," she said to him slowly.
A wild eagerness lighted his face.
"I'm not insulting you," he said. "I leave that to him.... I'm asking you to be my wife, Susan. Let him go. Let him release himself. Leave him to the woman from whom you can't keep him.—Come away with me,—and marry me!"
"I—cannot," she said.