She turned upon him sharply. "Whether it's hate or love," she prompted, laughing again, but at the same time clasping her hands nervously together. "They say the two are akin. But it had better be hate, Mr. Clithero. You said yourself this morning that we must be rivals, and rivals can't love each other, you know. You want to beat me out of the field, and I want to beat you--that's why I've bought back my Castor. Do you think I would ever have accepted him from you as a gift? Never, never! Without that money I should have given Castor up. But I knew how I could get it when I spoke to you this morning: yes, I knew what I had to do." She had moved away from him, and had placed the width of a little table between them. She stood by this, leaning her hands heavily upon it as though she needed its support. "We are to be rivals," she continued, "there's no getting away from it. You'd better hate me, Mr. Clithero, for if you get the better of me at the Derby I shall hate you--I can tell you that." "No, I love you." Mostyn moved round the table as though to take her in his arms, to crush her into submission. But she lifted one hand with an imperious gesture. "Don't speak of loving me," she cried; "it's absurd, impossible." Again she laughed hysterically. Her eyes were soft, and Mostyn thought he could detect a suspicious moisture glistening upon her lashes; but her voice belied her eyes. "It's just like with Castor," she panted. "You wanted Castor when there were so many other horses you might have bought. Now you want me, when there are hundreds of other girls." "Tell me"--Mostyn paid no heed to her wild and unreasoning words--"is there anyone else, Rada?" The recollection of the meeting that afternoon came to his mind. "Do you love Jack Treves? Is it from him that you have obtained this money--money that I don't want, and won't touch? You are not engaged to him--I should have heard of it if you were. My God!" A thought struck him, and he stepped quickly forward and passed his strong arm about the girl. "Rada, oh, you poor little thing! Look at me, if you can--tell me that you haven't promised yourself to him in return for this wretched money." Her head was bent, he tried to lift it, and to look into her eyes. He felt her yielding to him; he felt the trembling of her limbs, the heaving of her breast, the quick panting of her breath. He was trembling, too, as he gradually raised her face to his, as he gazed down into her eyes that were glistening with tears and with a strange light he had never seen in them before, as he marked her full, red lips, lips a little parted, and that seemed to shape an appeal. "Rada," he cried wildly, "you don't love any other man? I can read it in your eyes. Rada, I love you." His lips were to hers, and for one moment--a moment in which all the emotions of a lifetime were crowded, she lay impassive in his arms.