Her heart was beating almost painfully. To her, in her ignorance, the law was merely an instrument of injustice. She believed herself to be bound without hope of release by the document she had signed, and that the same inexorable law which had, only the other day, ruined Justin Carthew to raise her up in his place, would now force her to abide by whatever was written above her disastrous signature. The whole fair fabric of that wonderful new world to which she had so recently gained admittance had in these minutes come tumbling about her ears. And the crash of its falling palaces left her helpless and stupefied. She looked dizzily round at Captain Dove. But his features were quite unreadable.
"There's another point, Sallie," said Slyne, all his quick wits at work again as he saw the impression his words had made, determined to hammer home every argument that might weigh with her in her ignorance, "another point that I'd never have mentioned if you had been prepared to deal fairly with me after all I've done for you."
She shivered at that further thrust; she, who had never dealt unfairly with either friend or enemy.
"Even without your promise, you're mine—by right of purchase. You were Captain Dove's property before, as you know very well. He bought you and paid for you. And he sold you to me, to save you from a worse master.
"You can't say now that you didn't know what was ahead of you, for I told you, in Genoa. And I gave you a last chance, too, before we left Monte Carlo, to draw back and go your own way with him. Now you're doubly mine. Ask him, if you don't believe me."
The girl glanced in agonised appeal at the old man sitting motionless in his chair, his eyes on the ground. But Captain Dove merely nodded, like some mechanical figure.
Slyne scowled, as if at an end of his patience, and, striding across to the door, locked it, pocketing the key.
"However," said he, "I'm not going to argue with you. I've evidently wasted my time in treating you reasonably. Now, there are only two courses open to you. You can come my way, with me, or—"
He crossed the room again and pulled back the loose panel in the wainscot, pointed to the dark cavity it had concealed.
"There's a boat from the Olive Branch at the water-gate at the end of this passage. You're perfectly free to go back on board with Captain Dove, and—if you do, I wish you joy of your choice. I'm maybe not much of a catch as a husband, but—" He left the inference unspoken, significantly, daring her to go back to that dreadful fate by hinting at which he had once before forced her to change her mind.