“As I have said that I cannot say ‘yes,’ Colonel Quaritch, do you not think that I had better leave that question unanswered?” she replied in the same soft notes which seemed to draw the heart out of him.

“I do not understand,” he went on.  “Why?”

“Why?” she broke in with a bitter little laugh, “shall I tell you why?  Because I am in pawn! Look,” she went on, pointing to the stately towers and the broad lands beyond.  “You see this place. I am security for it, I myself in my own person.  Had it not been for me it would have been sold over our heads after having descended in our family for all these centuries, put upon the market and sold for what it would fetch, and my old father would have been turned out to die, for it would have killed him.  So you see I did what unfortunate women have often been driven to do, I sold myself body and soul; and I got a good price too—­thirty thousand pounds!” and suddenly she burst into a flood of tears, and began to sob as though her heart would break.

For a moment Harold Quaritch looked on bewildered, not in the least understanding what Ida meant, and then he followed the impulse common to mankind in similar circumstances and took her in his arms.  She did not resent the movement, indeed she scarcely seemed to notice it, though to tell the truth, for a moment or two, which to the Colonel seemed the happiest of his life, her head rested on his shoulder.

Almost instantly, however, she raised it, freed herself from his embrace and ceased weeping.

“As I have told you so much,” she said, “I suppose that I had better tell you everything.  I know that whatever the temptation,” and she laid great stress upon the words, “under any conceivable circumstances —­indeed, even if you believed that you were serving me in so doing—­I can rely upon you never to reveal to anybody, and above all to my father, what I now tell you,” and she paused and looked up at him with eyes in which the tears still swam.

“Of course, you can rely on me,” he said.

“Very well.  I am sure that I shall never have to reproach you with the words.  I will tell you.  I have virtually promised to marry Mr. Edward Cossey, should he at any time be in a position to claim fulfilment of the promise, on condition of his taking up the mortgages on Honham, which he has done.”

Harold Quaritch took a step back and looked at her in horrified astonishment.

“What?” he asked.

“Yes, yes,” she answered hastily, putting up her hand as though to shield herself from a blow.  “I know what you mean; but do not think too hardly of me if you can help it.  It was not for myself.  I would rather work for my living with my hands than take a price, for there is no other word for it.  It was for my father, and my family too.  I could not bear to think of the old place going to the hammer, and I did it all in a minute without consideration; but,” and she set her face, “even as things are, I believe I should do it again, because I think that no one woman has a right to destroy her family in order to please herself.  If one of the two must go, let it be the woman.  But don’t think hardly of me for it,” she added almost pleadingly, “that is if you can help it.”