"You're talking nonsense, and you know you are," he said very quietly. "You are my wife, and the law is on my side. I don't want to be harsh or unjust, but I can force you to come away with me this moment if I choose--not that I intend to," he added, meeting her terrified eyes, "because you are going to be a sensible little girl, and we are going to be very happy together. I want to do all I can for you. I want to give you everything in my power. I have found a school for the twins--a school where they will be well looked after and cared for, and ... Faith!" She had started to her feet. She was shaking in every limb, her face white. "You dare to try and take them away," she panted, fear of him swallowed up in her greater fear of losing the twins. "They belong to me! They are mine! They're all I've got in the world. I'll never let them go, never, never!" She broke down into violent sobbing. "Peg promised me she would help me keep them away from you. I suppose she's broken her word," she panted. "Peg is a sensible woman," said Forrester shortly. With all his pity and affection for her, he was losing patience fast. He believed firmness was the best method of managing her, after all. He rose to his feet. "I don't want to upset you, Faith, but we have had enough nonsense. The twins are going to school next week, and you are leaving this house and coming to live with me. I have arranged everything." She wrung her hands. "I will never live with you. I hate you. Mother hated you! You killed my father--you ruined his life." She was only repeating parrot-like what she had always been told of the "bad man"; of the true facts of the story she knew nothing. The Beggar Man turned very pale. "I have heard something of this from your friend Peg," he said grimly. "Possibly it _is_ true that through some business transaction I got the better of your father. But anyway it must have been years ago, and I never knew him personally. If they say all is fair in love and war, it's fair in business, too. He would have got the better of me if he had been able to do so, no doubt. Anyway, I mean to thrash the matter to the bottom, and let you know the exact truth, even if it goes against me to tell you. I may not be proud of everything that has happened in my life, but I'm not going to lie about it anyway.... Faith, stop crying!" His voice was harsh now, and Faith's tears dried as if by magic. She looked so forlorn, so very young, and a sudden revulsion of feeling swept through the man's heart. He was already bitterly disappointed with his marriage. He had had such wonderful schemes for moulding his wife to his own ideas, and now he knew that he had been a fool to ever hope anything from such a gamble! But he was a fighter, and he had no intention of acknowledging defeat. He held out his hand to her. "Come, Faith, be friends with me! You used to like me, you know," he added, with a faint smile. "And it's less than a month ago. A short time, surely."