nhood. If in the back of his mind he
had the conviction, hardly venturing to make itself a thought, "In the
long run it pays," it was but little to his discredit, since he could
scarcely have descended from a line of shrewd, far-sighted Anglo-Saxon
forefathers without making some such computation.

"If we're going to play a game," he continued, addressing Davenant,
before the latter had time to speak, "for Heaven's sake let us play it
straight--like men. Let the winner win and the loser lose--"

"I've no objection to that, Colonel, when I _do_ play--but at present--"

"Look here," Ashley said, with a new inspiration; "I put it to you--I
put it to you as a man--simply as a _man_--without any highfalutin
principles whatever. Suppose I'd done what you've done--and given my
bottom dollar--"

"But I haven't."

"Well, no matter! Suppose I had done what you've done--and you were in
my place--would you, as a man--simply as a _man_, mind you--be willing
to go off with the lady whom I had freed from great anxiety--to say the
least--and be happy forever after--and so forth--with nothing but a
Thank-you-sir? Come now! Would you?"

It was evident that Davenant was shy of accepting this challenge. He
colored and looked uneasy--all the more so because Olivia lifted her
eyes to him appealingly, as though begging him to come to her support.
It was perhaps in the belief that he would do so that she said,
earnestly, leaning forward a little:

"Tell him, Mr. Davenant, tell him."

"I don't see what it's got to do with me--" Davenant began to protest.

"It's got everything to do with you," Ashley broke in. "Since you've
created the situation you can't shirk its responsibilities."

"Tell him, Mr. Davenant, tell him," Olivia repeated. "Would you, or
would you not?"

He looked helplessly from one to the other. "Well, then--I wouldn't," he
said, simply.

"There you are!" Ashley cried, triumphantly, moving away from the wall
and turning toward Olivia.

She was plainly disappointed. Davenant could so easily have said, "I
would." Nevertheless, she answered quietly, picking up the paper-knife
that lay on the table and turning it this way and that as though
studying the tints of the mother-of-pearl in the dying light:

"It doesn't matter to me, Rupert, what other people would do or would
not do. If you persist in this attempt--this mad attempt--I shall not
marry you."

He strode to the table, looking down at her averted face and be