"Utterly impossible!"

"And to John?"

"I am speaking for myself and not for my brother," Stephen replied. "Men like him, who are a.s.sailed by a certain madness, are best left alone with it. That is why I came to you to bargain, if I could. Is there anything that you lack--anything which your own success and your lover, or lovers, have failed to provide for you?"

It was useless to try to rise; she was powerless in all her limbs. Side by side with the anger and horror that his words aroused was a sense of something almost grotesque, something which seemed to force an unnatural laugh from her lips.

"So you want to buy me off?"

"I should be glad to believe that it was within my power to do so. I have not John's great fortune, but I have money, the acc.u.mulated savings of a lifetime, for which I have no better purpose. There is one more thing, too, to be said."

"Another charge?"

"Not that," he told her; "only it is better for you to understand that if you turn me from your house this morning, I shall still feel the necessity of saving my brother from you."

"Saving him from me?" she exclaimed, rising suddenly and throwing out her arms. "Do you know what you are talking about? Do you know that if I consented to think of your brother as my husband, there is not a man in London who would not envy him? Look at me! I am beautiful, am I not? I am a great artist. I am Louise Maurel, and I have made myself famous by my own work and my own genius. What has your brother done in life to render him worthy of the sacrifice I should make if I chose to give him my hand? You had better go back to c.u.mberland, Mr. Strangewey. You do not see life as we see it up here!"

"And what about John?" he asked, without moving. "You tempted him away.

Was it from wantonness, or do you love him?"

"Love him?" she laughed. "I hate you both! You are boors--you are ignorant people. I hate the moment I ever saw either of you. Take John back with you. Take him out of my life. There is no place there for him!"

Stephen picked up his hat from the sofa where it lay. Louise remained perfectly still, her breath coming quickly, her eyes lit with pa.s.sion.

"Madam," he said, "I am sorry to have distressed you, but the truth sometimes hurts the most callous of us. You have heard the truth from me. I will take John back to c.u.mberland with me, if he will come. If he will not--"

"Take him with you!" she broke in fiercely. "He will do as I bid him--do you hear? If I lift my little finger, he will stay. It will be I who decide, I--"

"But you will not lift your little finger," he interrupted grimly.

"Why shouldn't I, just to punish you?" she demanded. "There are scores of men who fancy themselves in love with me. If I choose, I can keep them all their lives hanging to the hem of my skirt, praying for a word, a touch. I can make them furious one day and penitent the next--wretched always, perhaps, but I can keep them there. Why should I not treat your brother in the same way?"

He seemed suddenly to dilate. She was overcome with a sense of some latent power in the man, some commanding influence.

"Because," he declared, "I am the guardian of my brother's happiness.

Whoever trifles with it shall in the future reckon with me!"

His eyes were fixed upon her soft, white throat. His long, lean fingers seemed suddenly to be drawing near to her. She watched him, fascinated.

She was trying to scream. Even after he had turned away and left her, after she had heard his measured tramp descending the stairs, her fingers flew to her throat. She held herself tightly, standing there with beating heart and throbbing pulses. It was not until the front door had closed that she had the strength to move, to throw herself face downward upon the couch.

XXVIII

Louise ate a very small luncheon, but--an unusual thing for her--she drank two gla.s.ses of wine. Just as she had finished, Sophy came in, with ink-stained fingers and a serious expression.

"You silly child!" Louise exclaimed. "No one told me you were here. Have you had any lunch?"

"Long ago," Sophy replied. "I have been finishing your accounts."

Louise made a little grimace.

"Tell me the worst," she begged.

"You are overdrawn at your bank, your bills are heavier than ever this month, and there are five or six special accounts--one for some electric fittings, another for the hire of a motor-car--which ought to be paid."

"People are always wanting money!" Louise declared pettishly.

"People always will want money," Sophy retorted, "so long as you earn three thousand a year and spend four or five thousand!"

Louise selected a cigarette and lit it.

"Instead of scolding me, child," she yawned, "suppose you suggest something?"

"What is there to suggest?" Sophy replied. "Your bank has written you to put your overdraft straight at once--it comes to about two hundred and seventy pounds. There are bills, for which the people are asking for payment, and which come to about as much again. You've nothing but your hundred pounds a week, and you're spending half of that, as it is."

Louise flicked the ash from her cigarette.

"And even you, my child, don't know the worst," she remarked. "There's Fenillon, my dressmaker. She doesn't send me a bill at all, but I owe her nearly six hundred pounds. I have to wear a shockingly unbecoming gown in the second act, as it is, just because she's getting disagreeable."

"Well, I've tried to set things straight," Sophy declared. "You'll have either to marry or to borrow some money. You can't go on much longer!"

Louise was looking up at the ceiling. She sighed.

"It would be nice," she said, "to have some one to pay one's bills and look after one, and see that one wasn't too extravagant."

"Well, you need some one badly," Sophy a.s.serted. "I suppose you mean to make up your mind to it some day."

"I wonder!" Louise murmured. "Did you know that that terrible man from the hills--John Strangewey's brother--has been here this morning? He frightened me almost to death."

"What did he want?" Sophy asked curiously.

"He was a trifle vague," Louise remarked. "I gathered that if I don't send John back to c.u.mberland, he's going to strangle me."

Sophy leaned across the table.

"Are you going to send him back?" she asked.

"I am in an uncertain frame of mind," Louise confessed. "I really can't decide about anything."

Sophy poured herself out some coffee.

"I think," she said, "that you'll have to decide about John before long."

"About John, indeed!" Louise exclaimed lightly. "Who gave you the right to call him by his Christian name?"

Sophy colored.