“Oh, hell,” Fyfe grunted, when she had finished.  “This isn’t any place for you at all.”

He slid his arm across her shoulders and tilted her face with his other hand so that her eyes met his.  And she felt no desire to draw away or any of that old instinct to be on her guard against him.  For all she knew—­indeed, by all she had been told—­Jack Fyfe was tarred with the same stick as her brother, but she had no thought of resisting him, no feeling of repulsion.

“Will you marry me, Stella?” he asked evenly.  “I can free you from this sort of thing forever.”

“How can I?” she returned.  “I don’t want to marry anybody.  I don’t love you.  I’m not even sure I like you.  I’m too miserable to think, even.  I’m afraid to take a step like that.  I should think you would be too.”

He shook his head.

“I’ve thought a lot about it lately,” he said.  “It hasn’t occurred to me to be afraid of how it may turn out.  Why borrow trouble when there’s plenty at hand?  I don’t care whether you love me or not, right now.  You couldn’t possibly be any worse off as my wife, could you?”

“No,” she admitted.  “I don’t see how I could.”

“Take a chance then,” he urged.  “I’ll make a fair bargain with you.  I’ll make life as pleasant for you as I can.  You’ll live pretty much as you’ve been brought up to live, so far as money goes.  The rest we’ll have to work out for ourselves.  I won’t ask you to pretend anything you don’t feel.  You’ll play fair, because that’s the way you’re made,—­unless I’ve sized you up wrong.  It’ll simply be a case of our adjusting ourselves, just as mating couples have been doing since the year one.  You’ve everything to gain and nothing to lose.”

“In some ways,” she murmured.

“Every way,” he insisted.  “You aren’t handicapped by caring for any other man.”

“How do you know?” she asked.

“Just a hunch,” Fyfe smiled.  “If you did, he’d have beaten me to the rescue long ago—­if he were the sort of man you could care for.”

“No,” she admitted.  “There isn’t any other man, but there might be.  Think how terrible it would be if it happened—­afterward.”

Fyfe shrugged his shoulders.

“Sufficient unto the day,” he said.  “There is no string on either of us just now.  We start even.  That’s good enough.  Will you?”

“You have me at a disadvantage,” she whispered.  “You offer me a lot that I want, everything but a feeling I’ve somehow always believed ought to exist, ought to be mutual.  Part of me wants to shut my eyes and jump.  Part of me wants to hang back.  I can’t stand this thing I’ve got into and see no way of getting out of.  Yet I dread starting a new train of wretchedness.  I’m afraid—­whichever way I turn.”

Fyfe considered this a moment.

“Well,” he said finally, “that’s a rather unfortunate attitude.  But I’m going into it with my eyes open.  I know what I want.  You’ll be making a sort of experiment.  Still, I advise you to make it.  I think you’ll be the better for making it.  Come on.  Say yes.”