Page:The Whisper on the Stair by Lyon Mearson (1924).djvu/101

 not speak, letting this sink in. There was more to this than he had thought.

He had thought for a moment that perhaps this cripple had so frightened her that But it was more than that, he saw. There was a debt of gratitude to be paid, and she was paying it with the only thing she had—herself. It was a big price—too big, he decided. A shade of this must have flickered across his mobile countenance, because she spoke to his unuttered thought.

“Well, of course, it is partly, gratitude—it would have to be,” she told him frankly. “There are other things, though Things I cannot speak to you about. He was working for my father then—sort of an assistant manager of the stables, you know. My father kept him on all these years, until his death, as a confidential man—he often said he owed him more than he could ever repay. I think it became a sort of obsession with him in his last days, because he made me promise to marry Ignace.”

“And you were willing to⸺”

“I had to,” she said. “I would have done anything for my father—even marry Ignace Teck. Even though⸺”

“Even though you loathe him and are afraid of him?” he asked.

She nodded. “I am afraid of him—I don’t know why I should tell you all this, Mr. Morley—there is something about him, an intimation of cruelty—I know he’s unscrupulous and hard. He revolts me, at times—and then at other times he is a charming gentleman and I could almost bring myself to like him. But he’s a man who will go to any lengths to accomplish his ends. Yet I’ll marry him—eventually,” she said.