"No. That chapter can never be closed for me. I loved you from the first moment that we met, and I shall go on loving you till I die. I asked you to be my wife, and you refused me. The future mistress of Dashwood could not stoop to the son of a Californian rancher, though I happened to be an English gentleman by birth. I hope I took your refusal quietly, though it was a great blow to me. There can be no other woman for me, Mary." "I am sorry," the girl said, "but see how impossible it is. Perhaps I am a little old-fashioned, perhaps it is the fault of my bringing up. That like must mate with like has always been the motto of the Dashwoods. These new people, with their wealth and noise and ostentation can never cross the threshold of Dashwood Hall. My father is fond of finance, but he never dreams of bringing his City friends here." Darnley smiled to himself. He recollected the days in Paris, when Mary's father had been hand-in-glove with many a dubious French financier. "We are wandering from the point," he said. "In any case your strictures do not touch me, for I have no money. My poor father left me comfortably off, as he thought, but my mine of silver is ruined now, ruined by a firm of City swindlers whom I was fool enough to regard as honest men. It was a very bad thing for me when I came in contact with Horace Mayfield." It was the girl's turn to start guiltily. The beautiful face flushed once more. "I know Mr. Mayfield," she said. "He is the only one of my father's business friends who comes here. We make an exception in his favour, because he is so well connected. Frankly, I do not like him, but I thought that he-----" "That he is a cold-blooded and calculating rascal to the core," Darnley said. "I trusted him, and he left me almost penniless. Many people will tell you I am saying no more than what is actually true. And, because I am poor, I came down here thinking to find a little something that belonged to my people years ago. And so I met you, Mary, and discovered that I love you with the same old pure affection, that will go on burning in my heart till I die. It may strike you as strange that a poor man should speak to Miss Dashwood, of Dashwood, like this. Mind you, I am young, and strong, and able, and I shall come into my kingdom again. And love is worth all the rest; it is better far than money, or position, or pride of birth. If I could hear you say that you cared for me now! You are so beautiful; behind all your pride the woman's heart beats true enough. May God grant that you meet the right man when the time comes! I would give you up to him willingly and shake his hand on it. But to think of your being the wife of some brainless nonentity, of some brutal ruffian who has nothing but an old title to cover his moral wickedness, why the thought is unbearable. Mary, I think I could find it in my heart to kill that man."