“I can’t, because I don’t understand you. But I think this much is true, that you have set yourself against all laws of God and man. Yet you are not consistent, since you are better than your creed. You tell yourself there shall be no law for you but your own will, and you find there is, something in you stronger than desire that makes you shrink at many things. You can kill in fair fight, but you can’t knife a man in the back, can you?” “I never have.” “You have a dreadfully perverted set of rules, but you play by them. That’s why I know I’m safe with you, even when you are at your worst.” She announced this boldly, just as if she had no doubts. “Oh, you know you’re safe, do you?” “Of course I do. You were once a gentleman and you can’t forget it entirely. That’s the weakness in your philosophy of total depravity.” “You speak with an assurance you don’t always feel, I reckon. And I expect I wouldn’t bank too much on those divinations of yours, if I were you.” He rolled over so that he could face her more directly. “You’ve been mighty frank, Miss Messiter, and I take off my hat to your sand. Now I’m going to be frank awhile. You interest me. I never met a woman that interested me so much. But you do a heap more than interest me. No, you sit right there and listen. Your cheeky pluck and that insolent, indifferent beauty of yours made a hit with me the first minute I saw you that night. I swore I’d tame you, and that’s why I brought you to the ranch. Your eye flashed a heap too haughty for me to give you the go-by. Mind you, I meant to be master. I meant to make you mine as much as that dog that licked my hand before we started. What I meant then I still mean, but in a different way. “That’s as far as it went with me then, but before we reached here next day I knew the thing cut deeper with me. I ain’t saying that I love you, because I’m a sweep and it’s just likely I don’t know passion from love. But I’ll tell you this—there hasn’t been a waking moment since then I haven’t been on fire to be with you. That’s why I stayed away until I knew I wasn’t so likely to slop over. But here, I’m doing it right this minute. I care more for you than I do for anything else on this earth. But that makes it worse for you. I never cared for anybody without bringing ruin on them. I broke my mother’s heart and spoiled the life of a girl I was going to marry. That’s the kind of scoundrel I am. Even if I can make you care for me—and I reckon I can if y’u are like other women—I’ll likely drag you through hell after me.”