"You!" cried the man. "You were the chap that knew naught of women's ways. You'd scarce look one on 'em in the face. _You're_ not the build I thought they took to." "You told me that once before," said Murdoch, with a bitter laugh. "I've not forgotten it." Haworth's clenched fist fell upon the table with a force which made the keys ring. "Blast you!" he said. "You're nigher to her now than me--_now_!" "Then," Murdoch answered, "you may give up." "Give up!" was the reply. "Nay, not that, my lad. I've not come to that yet." Then his rage broke forth again. "_You_ to be going there on the quiet!" he cried. "_You_ to be making way with her, and finding her easy to please, and priding yourself on it!" "_I_ please her!" said Murdoch. "_I_ pride myself!" He got up and began to pace the floor. "You're mad!" he said. "Mad!" Haworth checked himself to stare at him. "What did you go for," he asked, "if it wasn't for that?" Murdoch stopped in his walk. He turned himself about. "I don't know," he said, "I don't know." "Do you think," he said, in a hushed voice, after the pause which followed,--"do you think I expect anything? Do you think I look forward or backward? Can you understand that it is enough as it stands--enough?" Haworth still stared at him dully. "Nay," he returned, "that I cannot." "_I_ to stand before her as a man with a best side which might win her favor! What is there in _me_, that she should give me a thought when I am not near her? What have I done? What has my life been worth? It may be nothing in the end! Good God! nothing!" He said it almost as if stunned. For the moment he was overwhelmed, and had forgotten. "You're nigher to her than I am," said Haworth. "You think because you're one o' the gentleman sort----" "Gentleman!" said Murdoch, speculatively. "I a gentleman?" "Aye, damn you," said Haworth, bitterly, "and you know it." The very words seemed to rouse him. He shook his clenched hand. "That's it!" he cried. "There's where it is. You've got it in you, and you know it--and she knows it too!" "I have never asked myself whether I was or not," said Murdoch. "I have not cared. What did it matter? What you said just now was true, after all. I know nothing of women. I know little enough of men. I have been a dull fellow, I think, and slow to learn. I can only take what comes." He came back to the table, and threw himself into his chair. "Does either of us know what we came here for?" he asked. "We came to talk it over," was Haworth's answer, "and we've done it." "Then, if we have done it, let us go our ways." "Nay, not yet. I've summat more to say." "Say it," Murdoch replied, "and let us have it over." "It's this," he returned. "You're a different chap from what I took you for--a different chap. I never thought of you--not once." "You've said that before."