"Oh, what does it matter who told me? It's true, isn't it? Why, you look different, Toni. You're not the lively, jolly, animated girl you used to be--all smiles and jokes. Toni, you're paler, and thinner--you've grown quiet, almost sad. It's because you're not happy--and--and I'd die for your happiness any day." His deadly earnestness could not fail to win response. Here at last was a passion unveiled before Toni's wondering eyes; and all at once the thing which had seemed impossible came down to the level of the things which--sometimes--happen. Here was a man who only asked to serve her; and if by accepting his service she could free her husband from the chain which bound him, all unwilling, to her, was it not the act of a coward to refuse? It may be said, and with truth, that Toni's view of the matter was perverted, distorted beyond all bounds of reason and of common sense. To leave her husband, to whom in spite of all she clung with every fibre of her being, for another man for whom she had not even the smallest atom of affection, was surely the most insane, inexcusable action in the world; and would after all only result in a negligible good, since the insult paid, to the man she betrayed would quite outweigh any relief in the freedom thus obtained. Then, too, she would be wronging Leonard Dowson; since to go away with him would lead him to suppose a degree of affection on Toni's part which was in reality non-existent; but Toni was not thinking of Dowson in this matter. There is no woman so absolutely ruthless towards the mass of mankind as the woman who loves one man completely. In this affair Owen was the only man who counted in Toni's mind; and she thought of Leonard Dowson merely as a convenient tool with which to effect her husband's release from the position he apparently found unendurable. That the reckoning might come afterwards, when Leonard should see himself as Toni saw him, she did not pause to consider. Indeed, on this occasion her thoughts were so wild and chaotic that she could hardly be said to have considered the matter at all. "Well, Toni?" Her long silence made him uneasy, and he paled, fearing he had angered her by his persistence. "Well?" She gazed at him absently for a moment, then woke suddenly to life. "Leonard, are you seriously asking me to go away with you? You mean you would take me away, and let my husband divorce me--for you?" "Yes, Toni." He spoke firmly; and, if for a moment all his lifelong visions of a respectable London practice, prosperity, the respect of those around him, seemed to rise up reproachfully before his eyes, he meant his words absolutely. "Would you really do it? You must be very fond of me," said Toni simply; and the young man was emboldened to proceed. "Of course I would do it, and of course I am fond of you." His voice shook a little. "Toni do you really mean that you will think about it--will give me the tiniest fraction of hope to keep me alive?"