"Are you angry?" he asked. Her teeth were still working on her under lip. She made no answer. "Strelsa--if you really feel nothing for me--if you mean what you have said about a purely business agreement--I will hold to it. I thought for a moment--when you said--something in your smile made me think----" "You need not think any further," she said. "What do you mean?" "I mean that I came with you this morning to tell you that I will not marry you." "That's nonsense! I've hurt you--made you angry----" "I came for that reason," she repeated. "I meant to do it as soon as I had the courage. I meant to do it gently. Now I don't care how I do it. It's enough for you to know that I will not marry you." "Is that final?" "Yes." "I don't believe it. I know perfectly well I was--was too impulsive, too ardent----" She turned her face away with a faint, sick look at the summer fields where scores of birds sang in the sunshine. "See here," he said, his manner changing, "I tell you I'm sorry. I ask your pardon. Whatever you wish shall be done. Tell me what to do." After a few moments she turned toward him again. "A few minutes ago I could have told you what to do. I would have told you to marry Mary Ledwith. Also I would have been wrong. Now, as you ask me, I tell you not to marry her." His eyes were deadly dangerous, but she met them carelessly. "No," she said, "don't marry any woman after your attentions have made her conspicuous. It will be pleasanter for her to be torn to pieces by her friends." "You are having your vengeance," he said. "Take it to the limit, Strelsa, and then let us be reconciled." "No, it is too late. It was too late even before we started out together. Why--I didn't realise it then--but it was too late long ago--from the day you spoke as you did in my presence to Mr. Quarren. That finished you, Langly--if, indeed, you ever really began to mean anything at all to me." He made a last effort and the veins stood out on his forehead: "I am sorry I spoke to Quarren as I did. I like him." She said coolly: "You hate him. You and Mr. Caldera almost ruined him in that acreage affair." "You are mistaken. Caldera squeezed him; I did not. I knew nothing about it. My agents attend to such petty matters. What motive have I for disliking Quarren?" She shrugged her shoulders disdainfully: "Perhaps because you thought he was devoted to me--and I to him.... And you were right," she added: "I am devoted to him because he is a man and a clean one." "Have you ended?" "Ended what?" "Punishing me." Her lips curled slightly: "I am afraid you are inclined to self-flattery, Langly. We chasten those whom we care for." "Are you silly enough to dismiss me through sheer pique?" he said between his teeth. "Pique? I don't understand. I've merely concluded that I don't need your fortune and I don't want your name. You, personally, never figured in the proposed arrangement." His visage altered alarmingly: