Page:Watch and Ward (Boston, Houghton, Osgood and Company, 1878).djvu/197

194 there forever! Hang it, sir, I am playing the part of a saint. I have but a word to say to settle my case, and to settle yours. But I have my eye on a lady neither so young nor so pretty as my cousin, yet whom I can marry with a better conscience, for she expects no more than I can give her. Nevertheless, I don't answer for myself. A man isn't a saint every day in the week. Talk about conscience when a beautiful girl sits gazing at you through a mist of tears! O, you have yourself to thank for it all! A year and a half ago, if you had n't treated me like a swindler, Nora would have been content to treat me like a friend. But women have a fancy for an outlaw. You turned me out of doors, and Nora's heart went with me. It has followed me ever since. Here I sit with my ugly face and hold it in my hand. As I say, I don't quite know what to do with it. You propose an arrangement, I inquire your terms. A man loved is a man listened to. If I were to say to Nora tomorrow, 'My dear girl, you have made a mistake. You are in a false position. Go back to Mr. Lawrence directly, and then we will talk about it!' she would look at me a moment with those beautiful eyes of hers, she would sigh, she would gather herself up like a princess on trial for treason, remanded to prison,—and she would march to your door. Once she 's within it, it 's your own affair. That 's what I can do. Now what can you do? Come, something handsome!"

Fenton spoke loud and fast, as if to outstrip self-contempt. Roger listened amazedly to this tissue of falsity, impudence, and greed, and at last, as Fenton paused, and he seemed to see Nora's very image turning away with