Page:Arthur Stringer--The House of Intrigue.djvu/315

295 I couldn't control, "I want to talk to you. I've got to talk to you. You're trying to do something you'll be sorry for, something you can't help being sorry for, all your life. This whole thing's too tangled for me to explain it to you here. But I want you to believe in me. I want you to know that I'm being sincere with you. If you take that stuff you're—you're going to spoil my life. And I know you don't want to do that."

He looked at me, with his deep-sunken eyes, but there was a glitter in them which I had never seen there before.

"I guess I'm not the zany who can do any spoiling along that line," he retorted. He said it roughly, but I thought, in my blindness, he was doing that only to hide his real feeling.

"But it could have been yours, Bud," I told him, trying in vain to keep my voice steady. "And I want you to believe every word I say when I tell you it can be yours still. I'll go with you, Bud, wherever you say, wherever you want, if you'll only do what I'm asking you!"

There was a movement from the man behind me. But I was not, at the moment, interested in that man. I was too intently watching Bud Griswold's face. I was looking for something, but I looked in vain.