For a moment the girl resented his air of masterfulness. She was not of the weak and pliable kind of women that could be carried away by wild a.s.sault. She looked up at him steadily now, and Leicester saw by the expression in her eyes that he had touched a wrong chord.

"Forgive me my rudeness," he said, before she had a chance to speak, "but I think a man in earnest is sure to be rude; he must be. Do not think, moreover, that I do not realise the value of what I am asking for. I do. I know that you have been sought after on all hands. I know that you are said to be rich, and that you can choose where you will.

Oh, yes; I have thought of all that, and I have realised my madness in coming to you; but I am a desperate man. No, no, do not think I have been simply attracted by a beautiful face. I have been seeing beautiful faces any time these last ten years; it's not that. It's you, you. I love you, I tell you, and if you cannot love me I shall go into a blacker h.e.l.l than I have yet known, and I shall go there with eagerness, and eagerness born of despair. But with your love I can do anything. Oh, I am not boasting, and I am not speaking before looking down to the very depths, but with your love I can live a life worth the living; I can make a position worth the making. Tell me, Olive Castlemaine, tell me that you can give a thought, a kind thought, a loving thought to me."

In spite of herself she was moved. Olive Castlemaine admired strong, masterful men. She could forgive rudeness where there was sincerity and strength, and certainly she had never been wooed in this way before. She could not help comparing Leicester with men like Purvis and Sprague.

They were weak and effeminate beside him. His very cynicism, his faithlessness seemed to her but as an expression of a strong nature, which was dissatisfied with conventions and a weak a.s.sent to commonly accepted beliefs. It is true she had seen his weakness, she had heard him express the purposelessness of his life; but she had also seen in him another Radford Leicester which was great and strong. And yet he had not won her. Something, she knew not what, told her to refuse. An indefinable fear, perhaps owing to her Puritan training and her healthy upbringing, kept her from uttering the words he longed to hear.

Still Radford Leicester had caused her heart to beat as it had never beaten before; never had she been drawn by such an admiration, an admiration akin to affection, as she was drawn now. He was a strong man, and she instinctively felt that in him were the possibilities of greatness and of goodness. She believed, too, that she could be the means of translating those possibilities into actual life; but she did not give him a ray of hope. A few minutes before, she felt like speaking. Now the desire had gone. She had nothing to say, she knew not why.

"You are thinking of what you have heard about me," he said, "are you not?"

"Perhaps."

He was silent for a moment. Perhaps it was because he thought of the night which led to this meeting, and as a consequence felt ashamed.

Once, on his way thither, he had thought of telling her the whole story, but now he would rather have suffered death than that she should know.

Even then he determined that if either of the men who were parties to the shameful compact, should divulge the secret he would make their lives a h.e.l.l. For Radford Leicester was not making love to gain a wager.

A pa.s.sion to which he had hitherto been a stranger had gripped him body and soul. At that moment Olive Castlemaine was everything to him. He would have bartered his immortal soul to gain her love. The cold, cynical crust of the man's nature had been broken, and the hot lava which had been lying beneath now burst forth.

"And you care for that," he said.

"Yes, I care for that."

"And if I had been what you call a good man, what then?"

"I do not know."

"But it would influence you?"

"It would influence me greatly."

"You believe in all you have heard?"

"You have denied nothing--and no, Mr. Leicester, even if I loved a bad man, I would crush that love--that is, as you have been speaking of it."

He called to mind what he had said to Sprague and Purvis on the night the compact was made, and while there was a feeling of joy in his heart at her words, the memory of that night pierced him like a poisoned arrow. This woman had disproved his creed by a single sentence. For he knew that she meant it. There was no weak, faltering hesitancy in her words. The flash of her eyes, the tone of her voice, told him that she had uttered no idle threat. Here was a nature as strong as his own, a nature which loved goodness as much as he had pretended to despise it.

He felt that the ground was slipping under his feet, but he retained his calm.

"Wait a moment," he said, "there is something else I want to say to you."

CHAPTER VII

A WOMAN'S HEART

If a few months before any one had told Radford Leicester that in order to gain a woman's good opinion he would excuse his own mode of life, he would have either grown angry or laughed that man to scorn. Yet he contemplated doing it at that moment. Perhaps if Sprague or Purvis had been in the room at that moment, they would not have been sure whether he were in earnest, or whether he were playing a part in order to win his wager. For they believed him to be capable of anything. But Leicester was not playing a part. He felt that nothing was too much, that no sacrifice was too great to win the woman who stood before him.

And yet in his sacrifice he would not appear to humble himself, for he was a proud man.

"In the past I have not taken the trouble to contradict idle gossip," he said. "I did not think it worth while. Besides, I did not mind what people believed about me. But I have the right to tell you the truth."

"Really, Mr. Leicester, there is no need, and I do not wish to hear confessions."

"But I have the right."

"What right?"

"The right of a man whose future is in your hands, the right of a man whom you can send to heaven or to h.e.l.l," he replied. "Oh, I am not speaking idle words. Forgive me if I seem to boast. I am no dandy who has made love a dozen times, and to whom a refusal means nothing but what a bottle of wine or a trip to the Continent can atone for. Whether your answer is yes or no, means everything to me. For you must become my wife, I tell you you _must_!"

The girl's eyes flashed refusal, even while they did not lack in admiration. No woman respects a man the less because he will not contemplate refusal.

"Listen, then," he went on. "You have heard all sorts of things about me. I am an atheist, I am a drunkard, I am a cynic, and I laugh at the standards of Mrs. Grundy. Yes, you have heard all that."

"And I have no right to interfere with your mode of life," she said, "only, Mr. Leicester----"

"Wait a moment before you say what is on your lips," he interrupted. "In this case it is for me to speak, and you can do no other than listen."

"Why?" she asked, almost angrily.

"Your sense of what is fair and honourable forbids you," he said. "Yes, I may be what is commonly reported, but there is another side even to that. Let me tell you, then, that I, who never professed to believe in what is called truth and honour, never willingly deceived any man, either by word or by deed. Yes, let me do myself justice. I, who have laughed at Mrs. Grundy and all her ways, never broke a promise made. And more, no man can accuse me of sullying either the honour of man or woman. I may be all that is said of me, but I am not that kind of man."

Something, not only in his words, but in his manner, appealed to her. In spite of herself, she gave him a quick, searching glance. There was something n.o.ble in his face, there was a healthy anger in his words.

Whatever his creed might be, he was not a bad man.

"I had the right to tell you so much," he went on; "that at least was my privilege, and now, having told you, I must tell you something else. You may refuse me once, you may refuse me twice; but in the end you will have to accept me."

Again there was a gleam of anger in her eyes, and he saw the look of scorn which rested on her face.

"I will tell you why. You cannot run the risk of sending a man to h.e.l.l.

With you as my wife I can do anything. Oh yes, I know my words seem like the words of a mountebank, but even my worst enemies have never accused me of being a boaster, and I repeat it; no guardian angel which your story-books tell about could do for a man what you could do for me. I could work, I could think, I could even become great and good. But without you--even the thought of it is like looking into h.e.l.l."

[Ill.u.s.tration: "With you for my wife, I can do anything."]

"And I," said Olive, "could have but little faith in a man who dared not stand alone. If a man's future, his character, his career, are dependent on a woman, then he rests upon a weak reed. A man to be strong must rest on G.o.d."

"That may be your theory; if it is, I know that human nature is always laughing at you. If G.o.d is, He's giving you the opportunity of making a man of me."

"I would try and help you," said Olive, "but what you ask is my love, and love cannot be given for the asking. It can only be given as it comes. In such a matter we are not free agents."

"And could you not love me? Answer me honestly, could you not love me?"

This was the first sign of Leicester's advantage. Her eyes dropped, and the colour came to her cheeks.

Leicester's heart beat aloud for joy; he could not repress a cry of exultation.

But Olive Castlemaine mastered herself by a strong effort of will.