"You know the kind of a fellow I've been," he said. "I've known women enough, and too many; but there's never been one like this. There's always been plenty like the rest. I sat and stared at this one like a blockhead. She set me trembling. It came over me all at once. I don't know what Ffrench thought. I said to myself, 'Here's the first woman that ever held me back.' She's one of your high kind, that's hard to get nigh. She's got a way to set a man mad. She'll be hard to get at, by George!" Murdoch felt his pulse start. The man's emotion had communicated itself to him, so far at least. "I don't know much of women," he said. "I've not been thrown among them; I----" "No," said Haworth roughly, "they're not in your line, lad. If they were, happen I shouldn't be so ready to speak out." Then he began and told his story more minutely, relating how, as he drove to the Works, he had met the carriage, and Ffrench had caught sight of him and ordered the servant to stop; how he had presented his daughter, and spoken as if she had heard of him often before; how she had smiled a little, but had said nothing. "She's got a way which makes a man feel as if she was keeping something back, and sets him to wondering what it is. She's not likely to be forgot soon; she gives a chap something to think over." He talked fast and heatedly, and sometimes seemed to lose himself. Now and then he stopped, and sat brooding a moment in silence, and then roused himself with a start, and drank more wine and grew more flushed and excited. After one of these fitful reveries, he broke out afresh. "I--wonder what folk'll say to her of me. They wont give me an over good name, I'll warrant. What a fool I've been! What a d---- fool I've been all my life! Let them say what they like. They'll make me black enough; but there is plenty would like to stand in Jem Haworth's shoes. I've never been beat yet. I've stood up and held my own,--and women _like_ that. And as to th' name," with rough banter, "it's not chaps like you they fancy, after all." "As to that," said Murdoch coldly, "I've told you I know nothing of women." He felt restive without knowing why. He was glad when he could free himself and get out into the fresh night air; it seemed all the fresher after the atmosphere he had breathed in-doors. The night was bright and mild. After cold, un-springlike weather had come an ephemeral balminess. The moon was at full, and he stepped across the threshold into a light as clear as day. He walked rapidly, scarcely noting the road he passed over until he had reached the house which stood alone among its trees,--the house Haworth had pointed out a few months before. It was lighted now, and its lights attracted his attention. "It's a brighter-looking place than it was then," he said. He never afterward could exactly recall how it was that at this moment he started, turned, and for a breath's space came to a full stop.