is certainly my right to demand that
you will cease to distress and trouble me.'

He stood with his eyes on the ground.

'That is all you have to say?' he asked, almost sullenly.

'What more can I say? Surely you should not have compelled me to say
even so much. I appeal to your kindness, to your sense of what is due
from a man to a woman, to let me leave you now, and to make no further
attempt to see me. If you refuse, you take advantage of my
powerlessness. I am sure you are not capable of that.'

'Yes, I am capable of more than you think,' he replied, the words coming
between his teeth. His evil demon, not himself, was speaking; in finding
utterance at length it made him deadly pale, and brought a cold sweat to
his brow. 'When you think afterwards of what I say now, remember that it
was love of you that made me desperate. A chance you little dream of has
put power into my hands, and I am going to use it. I care for nothing on
this earth but to make you my wife--and I can do so.'

Terror weighed upon her heart. His tone was that of a man who would
stick at nothing, and his words would bear no futile meaning. Her
thoughts were at once of her father; through him alone could he have
power over her. She waited, sick with agonised anticipation, for what
would follow.

'Your father--'

The gulf between purpose and execution once passed, he had become cruel;
human nature has often enough exemplified the law in prominent
instances. As he pronounced the words, he eyed her deliberately, and,
before proceeding, paused just long enough to see the anguish flutter in
her breast.

'Your father has been guilty of dishonesty; he has taken money from the
mill. Any day that I choose I can convict him.'

She half closed her eyes and shook, as if under a blow. Then the blood
rushed to her face, and, to his astonishment, she uttered a strange
laugh.

'_That_ is your power over me!' she exclaimed, with all the scorn her
voice could express. 'Now I know that you are indeed capable of shameful
things. You think I shall believe that of my father?'

Dagworthy knew what it was to feel despicable. He would, in this moment,
have relinquished all his hope to be able to retract those words. He was
like a beaten dog before her; and the excess of his degradation made him
brutal.

'Believe it or not, as you choose. All I have to say is that your father
put into his pocket yesterday morning a ten-pound note of mine, which he
found in a l