Instead of which he stooped down, picked her up in his arms, carried her
down the terrace steps and through the sleeping garden to the tea house
overlooking the Sound. Here he put her down and stood in front of her,
ready to catch her again if she tried to escape. In that place, not so
long ago, he had found her impossible.
"Now, then," he said, "come to cues."
She gave a scoffing laugh. "What is all this? An attempt to play the
primeval man, or what?"
"Be sarcastic if you like," he said. "I don't care. Be anything you
please, but play the game. You started it."
"Play the game!" she echoed, blazing with anger. "That's exactly what I
was going to do."
"I don't agree with you."
"What do I care whether you agree or not?"
"I'm going to make you care."
"Make me? You? Have you ever been able to make me do one single
thing?"
"This is where I begin. Sit down."
"I won't sit down." He put her into a chair and stood over her. He was
in no mood for conventionality.
"Dear me, how strong we are!" she said, like a rude little girl.
"Impertinence is wasted on me to-night. So try something else. We're
back again at the beginning of this game of yours, but to-night we start
afresh."
"So far as I'm concerned the game's over."
"Yes, but what you fail to realize is that you're not the only one
concerned. There's your family and there's me."
"I'm not going over all the old arguments again, I assure you. I tell
you the thing is over. You may be able to prevent me from telling the
truth to-night, but there's to-morrow and the day after. I'm in no
immediate hurry."
"I am though, and I'm going to keep you here until you give in to me."
"Order breakfast for eight o'clock," she said calmly.
He ignored her audacity. "You will do three unforgivable things by
telling the truth. You will put your people into a panic, hold me up to
the ridicule of the earth and hurt your reputation beyond any sort of
repair. It isn't sporting to do the first two and I'm not going to let
you do the other."
"My reputation----" She began, and stopped.
The word sporting dried up her words. It opened up a new point of view.
She had harped on this word in regard to him. She held it in high
respect. For the first time in their long and fluctuating struggle of
temperament he had scored.
He saw it and went on quickly. "Because of your people and because of
you,--I can always disappear,--I'm going to carry on your lie through
thick and thin. If, when I've finished what I've got to say, you go
back and tell them that you're not married to me I shall say that you're
lying again. I shall be believed and I shall first break every bone in
York's body and thrash the paragraphist into a hospital. Then, as soon
as McLeod's had his three days' leave you, being a sportsman, will come
aboard the _Galatea_ with me,--Malcolm's waiting,--and we will make a
bee line for the Irish Coast and get married in Queenstown. It's
impossible in this country now."
"And then, what?" she asked.
"Africa for me, home for you,--or anywhere else you like."
"I see. And are you childish enough to think that this precious plan
will kill scandal?"
"Yes. Why not?"
"Divorce,--what of that?"
"That's a small matter. You can't get a divorce without having first
been married. It's the question of marriage that we're up against."
Beatrix was silent for a moment. Her anger had gone. By the unexpected
use of that one word "sporting" he had convinced her that she couldn't
go back on a creed. Here was a man who had the right to enforce
something to which he had lived up so splendidly. She had made her bed
and must lie on it.
"May I get up?" she asked quietly.
"Please," he said, and stood back.
She went over to the wall and put her hands on it and looked out over
the silent water. Was she beaten at last? Had this man broken her as
well as unconsciously won her love? Was she to fail utterly in her
reiterated attempt to make him eat the words that had hurt her so? Was
she, in fact, quite down from the pedestal upon which every one had
placed her? A rush of tears blurred her eyes,--but only for a second.
She forced herself under control and looked round to see where Franklin
was. He hadn't moved. He was standing where she left him,--not looking
very much like a man who had won, she saw, without surprise. He was not
that kind of man, she knew.
"I want you," she said.
He went over.
"Will you tell me something?"
"Anything."
She felt the blood rush into her face. "Why was Ida Larpent in your
room the other night?"