Oakhurst (quietly). Perhaps, Jovita (taking her hand with grave
earnestness), to a clandestine intimacy like ours there is but one
end. It is not merely elopement, not merely marriage, it is
exposure! Sooner or later you and I must face the eyes we now
shun. What matters if tonight or later?

Jovita (quickly). I am ready. It was you who--

Oakhurst. It was I who first demanded secrecy, but it was I who
told you when we last met that I would tell you why to-night.

Jovita. I am ready; but hear me, Juan, nothing can change my faith
in you!

Oakhurst (sadly). You know not what you say. Listen, my child. I
am a gambler. Not the man who lavishes his fortune at the gaming-
table for excitement's sake; not the fanatic who stakes his own
earnings--perhaps the confided earnings of others--on a single
coup. No, he is the man who loses,--whom the world deplores,
pities, and forgives. I am the man who wins--whom the world hates
and despises.

Jovita. I do not understand you, Juan.

Oakhurst. So much the better, perhaps. But you must hear me. I
make a profession--an occupation more exacting, more wearying, more
laborious, than that of your meanest herdsman--of that which others
make a dissipation of the senses. And yet, Jovita, there is not
the meanest vaquero in this ranch, who, playing against me, winning