“There must have been a bishop, somewhere—you take to preaching so easily!” “It’s only to make it easier for you,” she reproved him. Then she added drearily, “Heaven knows, I’m not self-righteous!” “Then take me as I am, and you will be making it easier for me!” “I could, Jim, if I thought you would begin by doing one thing.” “And that is?” “Not try to get even with MacNutt.” She could feel the galvanic movement of uncontrol that sped down his knees. “When that damned welcher gives me back what is mine, fair and square and honest, then he can go his way and I’ll go mine—but not before!” “But, _was_ it fair and square and honest?” “About as much so as most of the money people get—and I’m going to have it!” “And that means going back to all the old mean, humiliating ways, to the old, degrading dodges, and the old, incessant dangers!” “But it’s ours, that money—every cent of it—it’s what we’ve got to have to start over again with!” “Then you will scheme and plot and fight for it? And keep on and on and on, struggling in this big quicksand of wrong-doing, until we are deeper than ever?” “Do _you_ forgive MacNutt?” “No, I do not! I can’t, for your sake. But I would rather lie and scheme and plot myself than see you do it. A woman is different—I don’t know how or why it is, but in some way she has a fiercer furnace of sacrifice. If her wickedness is for another, her very love burns away all the dross of deceit and selfishness!” “I hate to hear you talk that way, when you know you’re good and true as gold, through and through. And I want you to be my wife, Frank, no matter what it costs or what it means.” “But will you make this promise?” “It’s—it’s too hard on _you_! Think of the grind and the monotony and the skimping! And besides, supposing you saw a chance to get the upper hand of MacNutt in some way, would you fold your hands and sigh meekly and let it slip past?” “I can’t promise that _I_ would! But it’s you I’m afraid of, and that I’m trying to guard and protect and save from yourself!” She caught up his free hand and held it closely in her own. “Listen,” he broke in irrelevantly, “there’s a hurdy-gurdy somewhere down in the street! Hear it?” The curtains swayed in the breeze; the street sounds crept to them, muffled and far away. “Can’t you promise?” she pleaded. “I could promise you anything, Frank,” he said after a long pause. “Yes,” he repeated, “I promise.” She crept closer to him, and with a little half-stifled, half-hungry cry held his face down to her own. He could feel the abandon of complete surrender in the most intimate warmth of her mouth, as it sought and clung to his own. When her uplifted arms that had locked about his neck once more fell away, and the heavy head of dull gold sank capitulatingly down on his knee, the hurdy-gurdy had passed out of hearing, and the lintel-shadow had crept down to where they sat. CHAPTER XXIX