ce, no half-measures
could answer here. She knew that he was at the very door of her heart,
when it must either be slammed, bolted, locked in his face with a
lie or flung, with the truth, wide open for him to enter if he chose.

She hesitated, it is true; but it was not the hesitation of indecision.
When, only a few moments before, her senses have been giddily
balancing upon a precipice, saved from the hopeless downfall, only
because the man put out no hand to pull her over, a woman is not likely
to delay in doubt when at last he offers his hands, his eyes and his
voice to drag her into the ultimate abyss of ecstasy.

Sally delayed, only with the natural instinct of reserve. Eventually,
she knew she must tell him; if not in words, then by actions,
looks--even by silence itself.

"I never thought you meant that bet," she began in timid
procrastination.

"No--probably you didn't--but I did. And that's not the reason why
you're returning it now. Supposing we sponge out the debt and I tell
you to look upon it as a gift--would you keep it then?"

"No."

"Well--it's the wherefore of that I want to know. Why wouldn't you?"

"Because you have no right, no cause, to make me presents. You
practically told me so yourself--you said good-bye."

"But don't you take all you can get?" he asked, almost with brutality.
So the passion was stirring in him. All that came to his lips found
utterance.

At any time, she would have resented that. Now she knew instinctively
what the brutality in it expressed.

"No," she replied under her breath--"you might know I don't."

"And so you're returning this because I said good-bye--you're
returning this because I said I was not the type of man who hugs the
idea of matrimony. How could you take a gift from such a man--eh?
I suppose to you it savours almost of an insult. Yet, have you any
conception what your returning it seems to me?"

She shook her head.

"It hurts. Do you think you'd feel inclined to believe that? You'd
scarcely think I was capable of a wound to sentiment, would you? I
am in this case. I gave you that, because I couldn't give you other
things. That bangle was a sort of consolation to my thwarted wish
to give. I'm quite aware that a woman gives most in a bargain; but
a man likes to do a little bit of it as well. Half the jewellers'
shops in London 'ud have to close if he didn't. Some of 'em 'ud keep
open I know for the women who are bought and prefer the bargain to
b