"Say no more, Coralie! I am grieved and shocked that you should renew
the subject. I told you before I should never love any woman, save
Agatha Thesiger, were I to live forever."

"Nothing will ever induce you to change your mind?" she asked, slowly.

"No, nothing in the wide world."

She paused for a few minutes, then she quietly lifted her arm from the
chair.

"Has it ever struck you," she said, "it may be in my power to do you
deadly mischief?"

"I never thought you capable of such a thing, nor do I believe that it
is in your power."

"It is," she said; "you and your sister are both in my power. If you are
a wise man, you will take my terms and save yourself while there is
time. Of course, if I were Lady Trevelyan, my interests would be yours;
then, if I knew anything against your welfare, I should keep the secret
faithfully--ah! a thousand times more faithfully than if it concerned my
own life."

She looked earnestly at me.

"You hold no secrets of mine, Coralie. I have no secrets. Thank God, my
life is clear and open--a book any one may read. Supposing I had a
secret, I should not purchase the keeping of it by any such compromise
as you suggest. I detest all mysteries, Coralie--all underhand doings,