I am
therefore resolved to break off that intimacy. Do you comprehend me so
far?"
"Yes, I comprehend you so far," answered Miss Brewer, "perfectly."
"Considering Madame Durski's feelings for Sir Reginald--feelings of
which, I assure you, I consider him, even according to my own
unpretending standard, entirely unworthy--this intimacy cannot be
broken off without pain to her, but it might be destroyed without any
profit, nay, with ruinous loss. Now, I cannot spare her the pain; that
is necessary, indispensable, both for her good, and--which I don't
pretend not to regard more urgently--my own. But I can make the pain
eminently profitable to her, with your assistance--in fact, so
profitable as to secure the peace and prosperity of her whole future
life."
He paused, and Miss Brewer looked steadily at him, but she did not
speak.
"Reginald Eversleigh owes me money, Miss Brewer, and I cannot afford to
allow him to remain in my debt. I don't mean that he has borrowed money
from me, for I never had any to lend, and, having any, should never
have lent it." He saw how the tone he was taking suited the woman's
perverted mind, and pursued it. "But I have done him certain services
for which he undertook to pay me money, and I want money. He has none,
and the only means by which he can procure it is a rich marriage. Such
a marriage is within his reach; one of the richest heiresses in London
would have him for the asking--she is an ironmonger's daughter, and
pines to be My Lady--but he hesitates, and loses his time in visits to
Madame Durski, which are only doing them both harm.
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