"Write you a statement of release to Suzanne?" he observed, his lips curling—"how silly. Of course, I won't. And as for your threat to run to Mr. Colfax, I have heard that before from Mrs. Witla. There is the door. His office is twelve flights down. I'll call a boy, if you wish. You tell it to Mr. Colfax and see how much farther it goes before you are much older. Run to Mr. Winfield also. A lot I care about him or Mr. Colfax. If you want a grand, interesting discussion of this thing, just begin. It will go far and wide, I assure you. I love your daughter. I'm desperate about her. I'm literally crazy about her"—he got up—"she loves me, or I think she does. Anyhow, I'm banking all on that thought. My life from the point of view of affection has been a failure. I have never really been in love before, but I am crazy about Suzanne Dale. I am wild about her. If you had any sympathy for an unhappy, sympathetic, emotional mortal, who has never yet been satisfied in a woman, you would give her to me. I love her. I love her. By God!"—he banged the desk with his fist—"I will do anything for her. If she will come to me, Colfax can have his position, Winfield can have his Blue Sea Corporation. You can have her money, if she wants to give it to you. I can make a living abroad by my art, and I will. Other Americans have done it before me. I love her! I love her! Do you hear me? I love her, and what's more, I'm going to have her! You can't stop me. You haven't the brains; you haven't the strength; you haven't the resources to match that girl. She's brighter than you are. She's stronger, she's finer. She's finer than the whole current day conception of society and life. She loves me and she wants to give herself to me, willingly, freely, joyously. Match that in your petty society circles if you can. Society! You say you will have me drummed out of it, will you? A lot I care about your society. Hacks, mental light weights, money grubbers, gamblers, thieves, leeches—a fine lot! To see you sitting there and talking to me with your grand air makes me laugh. A lot I care for you. I was thinking of another kind of woman when I met you, not a narrow, conventional fool. I thought I saw one in you. I did, didn't I—not? You are like all the rest, a narrow, petty slavish follower after fashion and convention. Well," he snapped his fingers in her face, "go on and do your worst. I will get Suzanne in the long run. She will come to me. She will dominate you. Run to Colfax! Run to Winfield! I will get her just the same. She's mine. She belongs to me. She is big enough for me. The Gods have given her to me, and I will have her if I have to smash you and your home and myself and everyone else connected with me. I'll have her! I'll have her! She is mine! She is mine!" He lifted a tense hand. "Now you run and do anything you want to. Thank God, I've found one woman who knows how to live and love. She's mine!"
Mrs. Dale stared at him in amazement, scarcely believing her ears. Was he crazy? Was he really so much in love? Had Suzanne turned his brain? What an astonishing thing. She had never seen him anything like this—never imagined him capable of anything like it. He was always so quiet, smiling, bland, witty. Here he was dramatic, impassioned, fiery, hungry. There was a terrible light in his eyes and he was desperate. He must be in love.
"Oh, why will you do this to me?" she whimpered all at once. The terror of his mood conveying itself to her for the moment, and arousing a sympathy which she had not previously felt. "Why will you come into my home and attempt to destroy it? There are lots of women who will love you. There are lots more suited to your years and temperament than Suzanne. She doesn't understand you. She doesn't understand herself. She is just young, and foolish and hypnotized. You have hypnotized her. Oh, why will you do this to me? You are so much older than her, so much more schooled in life. Why not give her up? I don't want to go to Mr. Colfax. I don't want to speak to Mr. Winfield. I will, if I have to, but I don't want to. I have always thought so well of you. I know you are not an ordinary man. Restore my respect for you, my confidence in you. I can forgive, if I can't forget. You may not be happily married. I am sorry for you. I don't want to do anything desperate. I only want to save poor, little Suzanne. Oh, please! please! I love her so. I don't think you understand how I feel. You may be in love, but you ought to be willing to consider others. True love would. I know that she is hard and wilful and desperate now, but she will change if you will help her. Why, if you really love her, if you have any sympathy for me or regard for her future, or your own, you will renounce your schemes and release her. Tell her you made a mistake. Write to her now. Tell her you can't do this and not socially ruin her and me and yourself, and so you won't do it. Tell her that you have decided to wait until time has made you a free man, if that is to be, and then let her have a chance of seeing if she will not be happy in a normal life. You don't want to ruin her at this age, do you? She is so young, so innocent. Oh, if you have any judgment of life at all, any regard, any consideration, anything, I beg of you; I beg as her mother, for I love her. Oh!" Tears came into her eyes again and she cried weakly in her handkerchief.
Eugene stared at her. What was he doing? Where was he going? Was he really as bad as he appeared to be here? Was he possessed? Was he really so hard-hearted? Through her grief and Angela's and the threats concerning Colfax and Winfield, he caught a glimpse of the real heart of the situation. It was as if there had been a great flash of lightning illuminating a black landscape. He saw sympathetically, sorrow, folly, a number of things that were involved, and then the next moment, it was gone. Suzanne's face came back, smooth, classic, chiseled, perfectly modeled, her beauty like a tightened bow; her eyes, her lips, her hair, the gaiety and buoyancy of her motions and her smile. Give her up! Give up Suzanne and that dream of the studio, and of joyous, continuous, delicious companionship? Did Suzanne want him to? What had she said over the phone? No! No! No! Quit now, and her clinging to him. No! No! No! Never!! He would fight first. He would go down fighting. Never! Never! Never!
His brain seethed.
"I can't do it," he said, getting up again, for he had sat down after his previous tirade. "I can't do it. You are asking something that is utterly impossible. It can never be done. God help me, I'm insane, I'm wild over her. Go and do anything you want to, but I must have her and I will. She's mine! She's mine! She's mine!"
His thin, lean hands clenched and he clicked his teeth.
"Mine, mine, mine!" he muttered, and one would have thought him a villain in a cheap melodrama.
Mrs. Dale shook her head.
"God help us both!" she said. "You shall never, never have her. You are not worthy of her. You are not right in your mind. I will fight you with all the means in my power. I am desperate! I am wealthy. I know how to fight. You shall not have her. Now we will see which will win." She rose to go and Eugene followed her.