There was no sign on the down of anybody’s return, and she said, ‘I’ll think of it, sir.’
‘You have thought of it long enough; I want to know. Will you or won’t you?’
‘Very well; I think I will.’ And then she felt that she might be buying personal safety too dearly by shuffling thus, since he would spread the report that she had accepted him, and cause endless complication. ‘No,’ she said, ‘I have changed my mind. I cannot accept you, Mr. Derriman.’
‘That’s how you play with me!’ he exclaimed, stamping. ‘“Yes,” one moment; “No,” the next. Come, you don’t know what you refuse. That old hall is my uncle’s own, and he has nobody else to leave it to. As soon as he’s dead I shall throw up farming and start as a squire. And now,’ he added with a bitter sneer, ‘what a fool you are to hang back from such a chance!’
‘Thank you, I don’t value it,’ said Anne.
‘Because you hate him who would make it yours?’
‘It may not lie in your power to do that.’
‘What—has the old fellow been telling you his affairs?’
‘No.’
‘Then why do you mistrust me? Now, after this will you open the door, and show that you treat me as a friend if you won’t accept me as a lover? I only want to sit and talk to you.’