“Clayton has gone there?” exclaimed Canler, visibly chagrined.
“Why was I not told? I would gladly have gone and seen that every comfort was provided.”
“Jane feels that we are already too much in your debt, Mr.
Canler,” said Professor Porter.
Canler was about to reply, when the sound of footsteps came from the hall without, and Jane entered the room.
“Oh, I beg your pardon!” she exclaimed, pausing on the threshold. “I thought you were alone, papa.”
“It is only I, Jane,” said Canler, who had risen, “won't you come in and join the family group? We were just speaking of you.”
“Thank you,” said Jane, entering and taking the chair Canler placed for her. “I only wanted to tell papa that Tobey is coming down from the college tomorrow to pack his books. I want you to be sure, papa, to indicate all that you can do without until fall. Please don't carry this entire library to Wisconsin , as you would have carried it to Africa , if I had not put my foot down.”
“Was Tobey here?” asked Professor Porter.
“Yes, I just left him. He and Esmeralda are exchanging religious experiences on the back porch now.”
“Tut, tut, I must see him at once!” cried the professor.
“Excuse me just a moment, children,” and the old man hastened from the room.
As soon as he was out of earshot Canler turned to Jane.
“See here, Jane,” he said bluntly. “How long is this thing going on like this? You haven't refused to marry me, but you haven't promised either. I want to get the license tomorrow, so that we can be married quietly before you leave for Wisconsin .
I don't care for any fuss or feathers, and I'm sure you don't either.”
The girl turned cold, but she held her head bravely.
“Your father wishes it, you know,” added Canler.
“Yes, I know.”
She spoke scarcely above a whisper.
“Do you realize that you are buying me, Mr. Canler?” she said finally, and in a cold, level voice. “Buying me for a few paltry dollars? Of course you do, Robert Canler, and the hope of just such a contingency was in your mind when you loaned papa the money for that hair-brained escapade, which but for a most mysterious circumstance would have been surprisingly successful.
“But you, Mr. Canler, would have been the most surprised.
You had no idea that the venture would succeed. You are too good a businessman for that. And you are too good a businessman to loan money for buried treasure seeking, or to loan money without security—unless you had some special object in view.
“You knew that without security you had a greater hold on the honor of the Porters than with it. You knew the one best way to force me to marry you, without seeming to force me.
“You have never mentioned the loan. In any other man I should have thought that the prompting of a magnanimous and noble character. But you are deep, Mr. Robert Canler. I know you better than you think I know you.
“I shall certainly marry you if there is no other way, but let us understand each other once and for all.”
While she spoke Robert Canler had alternately flushed and paled, and when she ceased speaking he arose, and with a cynical smile upon his strong face, said:
“You surprise me, Jane. I thought you had more self-control —more pride. Of course you are right. I am buying you, and I knew that you knew it, but I thought you would prefer to pretend that it was otherwise. I should have thought your self respect and your Porter pride would have shrunk from admitting, even to yourself, that you were a bought woman.
But have it your own way, dear girl,” he added lightly. “I am going to have you, and that is all that interests me.”
Without a word the girl turned and left the room.
Jane was not married before she left with her father and Esmeralda for her little Wisconsin farm, and as she coldly bid Robert Canler goodby as her train pulled out, he called to her that he would join them in a week or two.
At their destination they were met by Clayton and Mr.
Philander in a huge touring car belonging to the former, and quickly whirled away through the dense northern woods toward the little farm which the girl had not visited before since childhood.
The farmhouse, which stood on a little elevation some hundred yards from the tenant house, had undergone a complete transformation during the three weeks that Clayton and Mr. Philander had been there.
The former had imported a small army of carpenters and plasterers, plumbers and painters from a distant city, and what had been but a dilapidated shell when they reached it was now a cosy little two-story house filled with every modern convenience procurable in so short a time.
“Why, Mr. Clayton, what have you done?” cried Jane Porter, her heart sinking within her as she realized the probable size of the expenditure that had been made.
“S-sh,” cautioned Clayton. “Don't let your father guess. If you don't tell him he will never notice, and I simply couldn't think of him living in the terrible squalor and sordidness which Mr. Philander and I found. It was so little when I would like to do so much, Jane. For his sake, please, never mention it.”
“But you know that we can't repay you,” cried the girl.
“Why do you want to put me under such terrible obligations?”
“Don't, Jane,” said Clayton sadly. “If it had been just you, believe me, I wouldn't have done it, for I knew from the start that it would only hurt me in your eyes, but I couldn't think of that dear old man living in the hole we found here. Won't you please believe that I did it just for him and give me that little crumb of pleasure at least?”
“I do believe you, Mr. Clayton,” said the girl, “because I know you are big enough and generous enough to have done it just for him—and, oh Cecil, I wish I might repay you as you deserve—as you would wish.”
“Why can't you, Jane?”
“Because I love another.”
“Canler?”
“No.”
“But you are going to marry him. He told me as much before I left Baltimore .”
The girl winced.
“I do not love him,” she said, almost proudly.
“Is it because of the money, Jane?”
She nodded.
“Then am I so much less desirable than Canler? I have money enough, and far more, for every need,” he said bitterly.
“I do not love you, Cecil,” she said, “but I respect you. If I must disgrace myself by such a bargain with any man, I prefer that it be one I already despise. I should loathe the man to whom I sold myself without love, whomsoever he might be. You will be happier,” she concluded, “alone—with my respect and friendship, than with me and my contempt.”
He did not press the matter further, but if ever a man had murder in his heart it was William Cecil Clayton, Lord Greystoke, when, a week later, Robert Canler drew up before the farmhouse in his purring six cylinder.
A week passed; a tense, uneventful, but uncomfortable week for all the inmates of the little Wisconsin farmhouse.
Canler was insistent that Jane marry him at once.
At length she gave in from sheer loathing of the continued and hateful importuning.
It was agreed that on the morrow Canler was to drive to town and bring back the license and a minister.
Clayton had wanted to leave as soon as the plan was announced, but the girl's tired, hopeless look kept him.
He could not desert her.
Something might happen yet, he tried to console himself by thinking. And in his heart, he knew that it would require but a tiny spark to turn his hatred for Canler into the blood lust of the killer.
Early the next morning Canler set out for town.
In the east smoke could be seen lying low over the forest, for a fire had been raging for a week not far from them, but the wind still lay in the west and no danger threatened them.
About noon Jane started off for a walk. She would not let Clayton accompany her. She wanted to be alone, she said, and he respected her wishes.