“That’s just it!” he said, quickly.  “I’ll have to go away down there, and I don’t know how long I may be kept; and—­and—­I thought if I could take with me some assurance that these altered circumstances would weigh with you—­you see, dear Kate, I am my own master now, I can do what I like—­and you know what it is I ask.  Now tell me—­you will be my wife!  I can quite understand your hesitating before; I was dependent upon my father; if he had disapproved there might have been trouble; but now it is different.”

Miss Burgoyne stood silent, her eyes fixed on the floor, her fingers interclasped.  He looked at her.  Then, finding she had no answer for him, a curious change of expression came over his face.

“And if you hesitate now,” he said, vindictively, “I know the reason, and I know it is a reason you may as well put out of your mind.  Oh, I am quite aware of the shilly-shallying that has been going on between you and that fellow Moore—­I know you’ve been struck, like all the rest of the women—­but you may as well give up that fancy.  Mr. Moore isn’t much of a catch, now!”

She raised her head, and there was an angry flash in her eyes that for a second frightened him.

“Magnanimous!” she said, with a curl of her lip.  “To taunt a man with being ill, when perhaps he is lying on his death-bed!”

“It is not because he is ill,” he retorted, and his naturally pale face was somewhat paler, “I dare say he’ll get well enough again.  It is because he is dead broke and ruined.  And do you know who did it?” he went on, more impetuously still.  “Well, I did it!  I said I would break him, and I broke him.  I knew he was only playing with you and making a fool of you, and I said to myself that I would have it out with him—­either he or I would have to go to the right about.  I said I would smash him, and I have smashed him.  Do you see this check?  That was waiting for me at my rooms this morning.  Eleven hundred pounds—­that was two days’ work only, and I had plenty more before.  But do you think it is his check?  Not a bit!  It is drawn out by a friend of his.  It is lent him.  He is just so much the more in debt, and I don’t believe he has a farthing in the world.  And that’s the wonderful creature all you women are worshipping!”

Now this foolish boy ought to have taken care, but he had been carried away on a whirlwind of jealous rage.  All the time that he was pouring forth his vengeful story, Miss Burgoyne’s face had become more and more hard; and when he ceased, she answered him, in low and measured tones that conveyed the most bitter scorn.