It was his hand that trembled. Hers was steady as she withdrew it. "I know," she said. "Then could not you think of me? I implore you to marry me." "You are speaking on impulse. We have hardly exchanged a word with each other for the last three months. You had no intention of asking me to marry you when you came here this evening." "I don't care what intentions I may or may not have had," said Stephen, his temper, always quick, rising at her self-possession. "I mean what I say now, and I have meant it ever since I first saw you." "Do you think I love you?" "I love you enough for both," he said with passion. "You are in my heart and my brain, and I can't tear you out. I can't live without you." "In old days, when you were not quite so rich, and not quite so worldly-wise, did you not sometimes hope to marry for love?" "I hope to marry for love now. Do you doubt that I love you?" "No, I don't. But have you never hoped to marry a woman who would care for you as much as you did for her?" "I can't expect that," said the millionaire. "I don't expect it. I'm not--I'm not the kind of man whom women easily love." "No," said Anne, "you're not." "But when I care, I care with my whole heart. Will you think this over, and give me an answer to-morrow?" "I have already answered you." "I beg you to reconsider it." "Why should I reconsider it?" "I would try to make you happy. Let me prove my devotion to you." She looked long at him, and she saw, without the possibility of deceiving herself, that if she told him she loved him he would not believe it. It was the conventional answer when a millionaire offers marriage, and he had a rooted belief in the conventional. After marriage it would be the same. He would think duty prompted it, her kiss, her caress. Oh! suffocating thought. She would be farther from him than ever as his wife. "I think we should get on together," he faltered, her refusal reaching him gradually, like a cold tide rising round him. "I had ventured to hope that you did not dislike me." "I do not dislike you," said Anne deliberately. "You are quite right. The thing I dislike is a mercenary marriage." He became ashen white. He rose slowly to his feet, and drawing near to her looked steadily at her, lightning in his eyes. "Do I deserve that insult?" he said, his voice hardly human in its suppressed rage. He looked formidable in the uncertain light. She confronted him unflinching. "Yes," she said, "you do. You calmly offer me marriage while you are firmly convinced that I don't care for you, and you are surprised--you actually dare to be surprised--when I refuse you. Those who offer insults must accept them." "I intended none, as you well know," he said, drawing back a step. He felt his strength in him, but this slight woman, whom he could break with one hand, was stronger than he.