She met the glance of his burning black eyes with undisturbed serenity, but a cruel smile had come again to the corners of her mouth.  She was preparing to settle her score with Gilmore in a fashion he would not soon forget.  One of her hands rested on the arm of her chair, and the gambler’s ringed fingers closed about it; but apparently she was unaware of this; at least she did not seek to withdraw it.

“By God, you’re pretty!” he cried.

“What do you mean?” she asked quietly.

“Mean,—­don’t you know that I love you?  Have I got to make it plain that I care for you,—­that you are everything to me?” he asked, bending toward her.

“So you care a great deal about me, do you, Andy?” she asked slowly.

“I like to hear you call me that!” he said with a deep breath.

“What is it, Andy—­what do you want?” she continued.

“You—­you!” he said hoarsely; his face was white, he had come to the end of long days of hope and doubt; he had battered down every obstacle that stood in his path and he was telling her of his love, nor did she seem unwilling to hear him.  “You are the whole thing to me!  I have loved you always—­ever since I first saw you!  Tell me you’ll quit this place with me—­I swear I’ll make you happy—­”

His face was very close to hers, and guessing his purpose she snatched away her hand.  Then she laughed.

As the sound of her merriment fell on Gilmore’s startled ears, there swiftly came to him the consciousness that something was wrong.

“You and your love-making are very funny, Mr. Gilmore; but there is one thing you don’t seem to understand.  There is such a thing as taste in selection even when it has ceased to be a matter of morals.  I don’t like you, Mr. Gilmore.  You amused me, but you are merely tiresome now.”

She spoke with deliberate contempt, and his face turned white and then scarlet, as if under the sting of a lash.

“If you were a man—­” he began, infuriated by the insolence of her speech.

“If I were a man I should be quite able to take care of myself.  Understand, I am seeing you for the last time—­”

“Yes, by God, you are!” he cried.

His face was ashen.  He had come to his feet, shaken and uncertain.  It was as if each word of hers had been a stab.

“I am glad we can agree so perfectly on that point.  Will you kindly close the hail door as you go out?”

She turned from him and took up a book from the table at her elbow.  Gilmore moved toward the door, but paused irresolutely.  His first feeling of furious rage was now tempered by a sense of coming loss.  This was to be the end; he was never to see her again!  He swung about on his heel.  She was already turning the leaves of her book, apparently oblivious of his presence.

“Am I to believe you—­” he faltered.

She looked up and her eyes met his.  There was nothing in her glance to indicate that she comprehended the depth of his suffering.